
Qass 
Book. 



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y^^ r 




'^.^£y8oi/d 



The "Author"' purt^nes his studies." 



lieiu-^^ork Iriiitorninj ; 



OR, 



GEMS OE JAPONICA-DOxAI 






JOSEPH." 



WITH ILLUSTRATIONS 



10. rt Srjra [leWeis firi o yEyuyvii^eiv to irav ; 
IIP. (pCdvoi [ji£v ovSctg, sag o'o^i'co, dpa^ai. 

^scHYLus, ''^Prometheus Chained^'' 1. G28. 



NEW-YORK : 
CHARLES B. NORTON, 71 CHAMBERS STREET, 

(IRVING HOUSE . ) 
Philadelphia: W. P. HAZARD. Boston: FETRIDGE & CO. 

AND MAY BE HAD OF ALL BOOKSELLERS. 

1851. 



frf- 






Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1851, by 

CHARLES B. NORTON, 

iji the Clerk's Office of the District Court, for the Southern District of New-York. 



Baker, Godwin & Co.\ Printers, 

Tribcnk Buildings, 

New-York. 






PREFACE, 



W'HICH IS SHORT ENOUGH TO BE READ, ANT) BAD ENOUGH 
TO BE SHORT. 

To THE Public : — If there is one thing more than another 
which is apt to prejudice the first casual glance of the reader 
in search of novelty, it is to encounter in the outset of a work 
from an unknown hand, a formidable display of tedious and 
unnecessary relations in reference to matters in which the 
public can have no earthly interest. It is apt to produce some- 
what the same sensations as are experienced by being ad- 
dressed, with outstretched hand and confidential manner, by a 
total stranger. People, if they care any thing about it at all, 
will read the work to know the man ; they don't wish to have 
a prosy placard a mile long stuck upon them. If my dearly 
beloved readers, by consuming the first edition of this publica- 
tion, evince a partiality for its continuance, it is highly prob- 
able they wUl be gratified. Although I crave for my labors both 
good opinion and patronage, I am candid to say that I infi- 
nitely prefer the latter. With wishes as go©d, possibly, as 
are felt by the majority, the Public's obedient servant, 

" Joseph." 



Note. — No. II. of these Sketches will continue the refresli- 
ing anatomy of ]Mrs. Fustian and family, together with the in- 
troduction of a " nice young man," and some familiiir faces. 



CIIAPTEE I. 

A-pxi TraiToj spyov [iEyisov. — Plato, 

. Haec ego mecum 

Compressis agito lubris ; \ibi quid datur oti 
lUudo chartis. 

[Horace, Lib. ist, Sat. iv., line 13G. 

At this particular period of affairs, there is perhaps no 
proposition of so orthodox a character, or one more firmly- 
fixed by general conviction, than that which asserts the pa- 
triotic and agreeable fact that this is a great country. The 
acknowledged rank we occupy in the present history of na- 
tions, the almost supernatural celebrity that has marked 
our social and political advancement, and the circumstance 
of living in probably the most remarkable age of the world, 
have all contributed to foster a belief in our natural superi- 
ority, and to produce some strong and pecuhar effect upon 
the physiology of the race. Of the changes thus wrought 
upon people, laws, politics, poetry, fashions, etc., there are 
necessarily countless shades and gradations. One may find 
it agreeable and beneficial to study the same subject in many 
ways ; to watch a nation in prosperity and adversity ; to 
weigh her motives in different scales ; to catch the manners 
and fashions of her people, and so be able to institute a 
comparative analysis. The true student of Nature or of 
Art differs from the false in this respect : that while the lat- 



6 NEW-YORK aeistocracy; or, 

ter is satisfied with a general view of his subject, making 
deductions according to a prescribed dogma of his own, or 
the accredited views of those particular masters he has 
chosen, the former employs in his contemplation every val- 
ued aid, studies each line and angle, views under full and 
fluctuating lights, rejects not the glass of many lenses, 
draws his conclusions from all legitimate sources, yet never 
allowing the fallible creed of Art — venerable though it be ' 
from age and associations — to take precedence of the im- 
mutable principles of truth. How many errors arising from 
an undue estimate of foolish but favorite theories, might 
have been avoided and buried in a wholesome oblivion, have 
yet, from obstinate and selfish vanity, been perpetuated in 
marble and brass, to remain an enduring satire upon those 
who would make a Jixed standard of examples, which 
should be only subsidiary/ to the great principles of truth. 
The manners of a people, as furnishing the indices of its na- 
tional character, are not unfrequently undervalued. It is, 
however, more true than the reverse, that many of the 
phases in which society is seen by the close observer, will 
often indicate, plainly enough, where certain salient points 
have taken their form and coloring. Of the truth of this, 
people will become more convinced, the more they watch 
the movements of the inner wheels in the great clock of 
human nature. I am by no means of the belief that writ- 
ings, having for their object a faithful portraiture of follies 
which lie on the face of society, are not capable of being 
the instrument of much good, or if not of actual good, at 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 7 

least of no positive harm. It is often only by having our 
attention particularly solicited to certain objects, that we 
are saved from an entire ignorance of them. The man of 
business gets up, eats his breakfast, and goes down town, 
and that is about all. It is the same thing to-morrow. He 
can tell you of stocks, or silks, or cotton and tobacco, and 
convince you of his profundity in commercial knowledge ; 
but when summoned for information upon the social condi- 
tion of the city in which he lives, nay, of the class in which 
he moves, he will be likely to betray a want of knowledge, 
that is not only ludicrous, but hardly conceivable. The life 
of trade to which he has been tied, has apprenticed him to 
an existence of mechanical drudgery, as monotonous as that 
of the gate-keeper on a turnpike. In the particular walks 
in which he follows his business interests, he may have ac- 
quired a wondrous amount of practical knowledge ; but of 
the elegant and liberalizing pursuits in art or literature, 
which may always be profitably associated with the labor 
that brings us bread, he knows little of, and cares less. To 
such automatons it would be of little avail to address any 
serious advice, but it is possible that a picture of their own 
firesides, of the life at home, where they go only for a few 
hours of rest, to fit them for toiling days, may awaken a 
slumbering interest, if it does not furnish vivid amusement. 
The following sketches of character are from among 
those circles which offer, gratuitously, the most conspicuous 
subjects for criticism. It is their design to display, with all 
possible fidehty, different t3^pes of the prominent notables 



among the, so called, Aristocracy of New -York. I beg 
pardon of the AristGcracj, par excellence, for presuming to 
suppose the existence of a class who aspire to a position 
which ih€2/ only occupy, or ought to, if "possession is nine- 
tenths in law." In the management of a subject with so 
great a diversity of character, it will be impossible, in produc- 
ing a just aggregate, to avoid allusions somewhat foreign to 
the subject matter ; as, also, the introduction of personages 
not properly indigenous to Manhattan ; but, from intimate 
connection with the arrangements of the ruling sets, have be- 
come " part and parcel " of their reputation with the world* 
and important constituents of their " body politic." Such 
an one is Mr. Pindlekins, who, though a naturalized citizen, 
with power to vote for the rulers of our dear republic, and 
occupying his place as "sum punkins " among the syllabub 
gentry, is nevertheless (and he will tell you it is his greatest 
honor) a representative of one of the oldest first families of 
the old dominion of old Virginia. By a late act of the Vir- 
ginia Legi>lature, assembled at the great Capitol of the 
State, an associate to the Inspector of the State census 
was appointed, for the purpose of ascertaining if there 
were any family or families who could not justly lay claim 
to being of the first family order. The report rendered by 
this officer, states that, out of ten thousand families visited, 
inspected, and diligently inquired of, nine thousand, nine 
hundred, and ninety-nine, were found to be of the first wa- 
ter; while only one was marked below par, and that one so 
set down by its own acknowledgment. On a receipt of 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 9 

this report a special session was immediately called, to de- 
vise and adopt such legal measures as would most effectu- 
ally guard the country from an increase of so great an evil ; 
and suggest some plan by which the said family should be 
induced to expatriate themselves. It was proposed and car- 
ried that a tax of forty cents per capita, on all white adults, 
should be levied ; which, with the profits of one month's 
restriction of the use of tobacco among all negroes, should 
be appropriated, as a bribing fund, to induce this wretched 
second-rate family to absquatulate for parts unknown, and 
also to secure its eternal secrecy. Virginia has now to con- 
gratulate herself on a disinterested and public spirited act, 
that has relieved her of the annoyance of an undignified evil. 
G. W. J. M. M. P. H., or otherwise George Washington Jef- 
ferson Madison Monroe Patrick Henry Pindlekins, is proba- 
bly from either Richmond or Fredericksburgh, or at any rate 
he registers his name at the hotels as being from one of those 
celebrated cities. When Patrick Henry Pindlekins went 
abroad, the chance acquaintances of travel were soon blessed 
with a knowledge of the precise spot, in old Vii-ginia, where 
his eyes first saw light ; as well perhaps of the fact, that the 
d — d French rolls shouldn't be put on the same shingle 
with johnny-cake — in fact, that corn bread is corn bread, 
and no mistake — and he shall treat it as a personal insult, 
if any one mentions French slop wines and mint juleps in 
the same breath. Mint juleps he pronounces as pre- j 
eminently ^' hiphenutanj' and regards them as part of thef 
glory of the great State he represents. He informs the as- 



10 

tonished foreigners, that the grave of Virginians is marked 
by the mint, that springs spontaneously to consecrate their 
repose, as with a pecuhar and appropriate emblem. The 
Vatican he considers a tolerably "peart " piece of shingling, 
but of " no account " beside the *' Natural Bridge " — he 
takes an acolothist by the sleeve, and tells him that the 
Pope is very well, so far as he goes, but that he ovight to 
just see the inauguration of an American President. When 
on the Pyramids, he spends half a day in sculpturing his 
name and residence, in full, on the stones of those (as he 
calls them) ** tall performances," entirely satisfied that visit- 
ors to these wonderful works of art, will bear away with 
them, as the most astonishing part of their adventures, a re- 
membrance of the name of Patrick Henry Pindlekins, of 
Fredericksburgh, Virginia. With the Sphinx's head he cul- 
tivates a characteristic acquaintance by shooting at its nose, 
at the word, sixteen paces distant, determined to keep his 
hand in, classically, by a crack at the old monster. 

Having succeeded in rendering this Egyptian " bull's 
eye" into a leaden hue, by virtue of ninety two balls out of a 
hundred immediately upon the proboscis, he says he should 
like to bet fifteen to five that he chips the ear four times out 
of six, and is only deterred from the attempt by the bet re- 
maining untaken. His keen attainments with hair triggers 
have made him a terror with the crocodiles of the Kile. It 
reminds him of the times when he practised at turtles on a 
log in the old horse pond home. Indeed, there appears to 
be no novelty for which his imagination does not form a 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 11 

Virginia duplicate. He is in constant trouble with ideas of 
the Natural Bridge — thinks that Mahomet would have 
chosen precisely such a spot for his suspension — would like 
to see the remnants of a cat after being dropt from its 
heights — is confident that the time will come when the na- 
tions of the earth shall be gathered under its majestic arches 
to chant their hallelujahs to the Blue Ridge. Mont Blanc / 
is something as a snow ball, with a right smart chance of 
icicles, but he could live a thousand years on the Blue 
Ridge and never want to leave. His admiration for Baden / 
Baden is very much quahfied by recollections of the White 
Sulphur Springs. He argues that the medicinal qualities of 
the waters must decide the merits of the two places ; that 
the superiority of one to the other in social attractions does 
not alter their value. Having learnt how to gamble a little 
during his tour, he creates a sensation at one of the princi- 
pal tables by forcing the banker at the point of a foot of 
cold steel, to disgorge a thousand francs, which he had 
caught the fellow hauling in from him by a trick of the trade. 
As to the Thames tunnel, he thinks it would make a very 
fine " horn," and only wishes he was big enough to take it. 
His views upon such subjects as attract general attention 
among travellers abroad, would afford us, I have no doubt, 
some very interesting and original ideas. At a time when 
there is such an abundance of information offered to the 
public on these lands, his lucubrations, from their unique 
character, would prove quite refreshing. I indulge the hope 
that he will think favorably of the suggestion, and gratify 



12 NEw-YOKK aeistocracy; oe, 

the world with the experience of a gentleman from one of 
the first families of Virginia. We have endeavored to re- 
cord a few of the occurrences that befell our hero abroad* 
and the casual impressions produced on his mind from the 
study of different curiosities in art and nature. If in the 
character of Mr. Pindlekins as a foreign tourist, the reader 
has felt disposed to smile at some of the peculiarities intro- 
duced, it is well, before he goes farther in making up his 
estimate, to follow the delineation of his qualities as a dwell- 
er upon his native soil, and I am much mistaken if he does 
not find that, like others, he has been prejudiced by viewing 
things out of their proper element, or in other words, that 
Patrick Henry at Baden, in the Tunnel, or among the Pyra- 
mids, is a fish very much " out of water," and very unlike 
the same gentleman when wearing out shoe leather on na- 
tive gravel. Mr. Pindlekins might travel half his life with- 
out danger of impairing his patriotic allegiance, and it is 
therefore no more than fair in judging of his attributes, to 
remember how powerful an influence the sentiment of " amor 
patrise" may have upon him. As for temper, liK^ has enough 
to fortify all the Damascus blades that were ever manufac- 
tured, but then its operations are as quick as the elec- 
tric fluid — a flash — a glare — a crash — and the storm is 
gone. Born a gentleman, with his fathers before him all 
gentlemen, and coming from a State where the pride of an- 
cestry is a living sentiment that pervades and manifests itself 
in every thing, it is scarcely to be wondered at that a con- 
stitutional sensitiveness, inherited from nature and fostered 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 13 

by early prejudices, should liave becorue somewhat exag- 
rv.^.-+ed, and occasionally brought forward inopportunely. 
'' taught as a part of his religious creed, to believe that 
1 is responsible to his compeers for what he does and 
*' at all times, in all ways, and under all circumstances," 
he is to be found posted on all the delicate and comphcated 
technicalities of the code regulating affairs of honor, and in 
case of difficulties of a serious nature is immediately called 
upon to superintend. His good judgment, and disposition 
to avoid actual hostilities, enable him usually to conduct 
matters to a peaceful termination ; but if there is no escape, 
and the thing has to be done, his ingenuity in accomplishing 
his mission, and yet avoiding the legal penalty, is worthy of 
all admiration. He conscientiously devotes a certain por- 
tion of his time to the practice of pistol shooting, and gal- 
leries devoted to that elegant pastime look upon him as a 
generous patron. His exercises are always watched with 
curiosity by an admiring crowd, and such is the fame of his 
aim, that there is a report current that on several occasions 
his approach was heralded by the bell behind the " bull's 
eye" beginning to ring of its own accord. Mr. Pindlekins, 
besides being a person of decidedly musical tastes, possesses 
considerable talent in that respect. He has some knowledge 
of the instrument so popular in his native State, the banjo, 
and considers it endowed with great power and sweetness, 
but confesses that it might be charged with a little same- 
ness of tone. He has a fine ear, and is an acquisition in a 
general chorus. Having overcome his prejudices against a 



14 NEw-YOKK aeistocract; or, 

foreign style of music, he is a strong advocate of the Itahan 
Opera. Really enjoying the music, he can keep his seat, 
and refrain from the detestable habit of annoying those 
about him by loud and ill-timed conversation. In the inter- 
lude he does the agreeable to Mrs. Lavender, and is thorough- 
ly convinced that he has made that lady unhappy, which 
(as it flatters him) is a state of things she is very far from 
being hostile to. He entertains Old Gabby and her daugh- 
ter in a manner eminently pleasing to that venerable biddy 
with one chicken. Mrs. Gabby is a perfect old crocodile 
about her daughter, keeping that piece of tempting bait to 
lure within the snap of her ponderous jaws the unsuspecting 
innocent. Patrick Henry is, however, wide awake, being a 
man of much experience in things of this nature ; and al- 
though one of the most susceptible men in the world, is re- 
served probably for a better fate than that of alliance with 
so unctuous and crafty a piece of plumptitude as the young- 
er Gabby. At the least calculation he has been in love, or 
believed that he was, one hundred times, and out of it twice 
that number. Being of a very mercurial temperament, he 
does not take his love affairs very hard, and manages to keep 
a pretty good appetite, and sleep very soundly, in spite of 
the ill usages of the tyrant Cupid. Like most social men, 
he makes many friends, and when in their society you would 
think they were all his bosom companions, but with the ma- 
jority it is "out of sight out of mind." Of his means, or 
his services, they are altogether, and at all times, at the 
disposal of those that are entitled to them. He will lend 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 



15 



his last copper, or share his only shilling, and if the thing 
was possible, and necessary, would give away his eyes and 
look through his buttons. With such ideas, it is not aston- 
ishing that he does not increase his worldly goods. A man 
that doesn't think of the value of a penny isn't apt to about 
that of a pound. It would be difficult to mention all the 
people or places for which he has a periodical enthusiasm. 
It embraces a wide range with great variety of objects. At 
one time he may be observed playing billiards for a basket 

of champagne with Mr. Bonmot, proprietor of the 

Hotel, who keeps a big house for the public and a big heart 
for his friends, who admires fine horses and fine diamonds, 
and has both of them ; at another he exchanges views in 
regard to horse flesh with Mr. Samuel Segew, who is sup- 
posed to be as good as the next man in his judgment of 
horses, or in drawing a rein over them ; again he may be 
seen on terms of affecting intimacy with Mr. Loud, a repre- 
sentative of the Long Island or shell-fish aristocracy, whose 
family is coeval with the oldest clam banks, and himself a 
very edifying specimen of bivalvular dignity. Between this 
gentleman and Mr. Pindlekins there exists a state of peculiar 
and brotherly confidence, which we can only hope will be 
conducive to their mutual advantage. On a sudden, from 
some unknown cause, the needle of his compass will work 
round in the direction of Grammercy Park, and as suddenly 
slip down to La^^fayette Place. At one time old Gabby 
thought her gosling's chances were gone, by having conclud- 
ed from certain observations that Patrick Henry was deep 



16 



in his designs on the Rumkees of the Bleecker-street reo-ime. 
Mrs. Fustian (to whom the reader will be shortly introduced) 
after a few pohtic reflections, has concluded to visit peoph 
who live in Bleecker-street, but refuses to perspire below tha 
hne. I do not know whether it would be necessary that th( 
political bias of Patrick Henry should be laid before the 
public. Though not troubling himself much about public 
affairs, he still feels a strong interest in the ruling questions 
of the day. Occasionally when as a Southerner, with a con- 
sciousness of the rights guaranteed by the constitution to 
every State in the Union, his sensibilities have been wound- 
ed by the treasonable conduct of Abolitionists, or the folly 
of Free-soilism, true to his explosive nature, he comes out 
strong for south of Mason and Dixon's line; but on the whole 
I think he may be set down as a pretty good Unionist. In 
justice to this type of Virginian aristocracy, I must say that 
my descriptions refer more to his attributes when first ap- 
pearing on the stage of New- York society, than to his pres- 
ent deportment. A long residence here, together with for- 
eign travel, has been instrumental in liberalizing his views, 
and to a considerable extent destroying those strong preju- 
dices so characteristic of his countrymen generall3^ My 
candid belief is, that at the present time he is willing to ad- 
mit that the sun rises and sets in some few other places be- 
sides Fredericksburgh. At all events, his present position 
authorizes us to regard him as an integer of some importance 
in the w^alks of society above Bleecker. *' May he live a 
thousand years, and his shadow never be less." 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 17 



CHAPTEK IL 

O cives, cives, querenda pecunia primum est 
Virtus post nummos. 

[Epistles of Horace, Lib. Ist, line 53, 

People who have not been bora and brought up in this 
modern Babel — this city of nations — are very much puzzled 
in trying to resolve society into any distinctive orders. 
They may be very excellent judges of ordinary combinations, 
and have as good reason to suppose that they are as well 
qualified as the majority to find the causes of effects, and 
yet be obliged to own up when asked to unfold this social 
problem. It is not at all surprising. Even those who have 
had (as they may choose to call it) the good or the bad 
fortune to have first opened their eyes to the light, and 
their ears to the unceasing din of carts on old Manhattan, 
and thence amidst the city proper, have grown to be " chil- 
dren of larger growth," are oftentimes as little able as 
strangers to explain satisfactorily this singular phenomenon. 
Had I the capacity or inclination to wade through such a 
labyrinth as the elucidation of this would involve me in, I 
should be effectually prevented, out of tender mercy to my 
reader. Those who are sufferers, or imaginary sufferers, 
from chagrin, at certain conditions imposed by the laws 
of society in which they live, are not to be consoled by any 
philosophy that may be assigned for the fact. Leaving these 
things for such as are fond of curious abstractions, I will 



18 NEW-YORK aristockacy; or, 

assert a broad and undeniable fact — as data for others as 
well as myself — that the material of which modern fashion- 
able society is composed, may be summed up in two words 
— Wealth and Tact. This is susceptible of a logical demon- 
stration, and I am perfectly willing to give one at a right 
time, and on a proper occasion. It may be flattering and 
yet be true, to suppose that there are many who, having 
nothing to fear, would concur in this opinion. There are 
others enjoying their "brief hour," who would not think it 
worth their while to controvert, on a subject that might 
possibly disturb the comfortable security that they are 
merely in titular possession of. Very apropos, there goes 
an illustration of the class I allude to — a perfect octavo in 
calf, which, if you like, we will look into and study. Watch 
her as in her carriage she rolls down Broadway, in fat flannels 
and favor — remark the carriage, a true ark of safety, fifteen 
by five ; what a grand, extension concern, and as if taking 
the cue from its perspiring occupant, seems to spare no 
pains in fiUing as much space as possible, whether by 
right or not. 

The wheels are all stout, strong wheels, as needs be, to 
support such a clear, dead weight, and as they revolve on 
their well oiled axles, sigh, wearily with their labor, and 
now and then (queer wheels) will snatch up a bit of pure 
mud, throw it quickly in at the low carriage door, still con- 
tinuing their evolutions as if they had done nothing, save 
perhaps, to have suggested in a slightly figurative way, the 
natural element of the " free-soil" fashionables — an accidental 
emblem of the bespattered type. You are curious, I see, 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. lO 

to learn the colour of the carriage, and perhaps whether the 
carriage is the only thing that is painted ; but I shan't tell you. 
May I ask you digressively, what style of horses you like ? 
the " silver grays" or iron, the bays, chestnut or the cross ? 
the bob or the long tail ? You may enjoy your private 
fancy, but I shall not betray the color of " our" horses, or 
of the men on the box, though I will tell you that there are 
crests on the harness ; whether got up " to order" by our 
friend Smith, the herald chaser in Reade street, or purchased 
privately from some Gallic refugee, at a time when the now 
republicanized land of Monsieur Crapeau furnished its pat- 
ents of nobility for " value received," is more than I can say. 
For those in need, let me state that there is no great 
difficulty in obtaining an emblazoned escutcheon in this land, 
where every thing can be won and worn ; won with wealth 
and worn with impudence. There are Messrs. Tomlinson 
& Wood, who are deep in the knowledge and documents of 
heraldry, that have helped many a poor devil to a coronet 
on a coach door : only when you negotiate, be careful to en- 
join secrecy, and remember that it is entirely unnecessary 
for you to inform them that your family arms have unfortu- 
nately been lost : they know that as well as you do, and 
more, that they were never found. Now, our friend in the 
carriage (who I shall call Mrs. Fustian), although she rather 
affects crests, and will talk learnedly about them by the 
hour with you (she is never without a book of the Peerage 
at hand), is a little sensitive on the subject of coats of arms. 
Coats of arms may have more than one meaning — there may 
be a disagriSeable significance if the word coats is empha- 



20 NEW- YORK ARISTOCRACY ; OR, 

sized — it is perhaps painfully suggestive of a professional 
ancestry, and besides, who wants to pin their faith on any 
man's coat. Ingeed, I am told she took it in very high 
dudgeon, because a person with whom she was conversing 
chanced to quote a passage of Scripture which refers to the 
difficulty of " threading a needle " with a camel. She was 
sure there was something meant ; she is always sure some- 
thing is meant if accidental mention is made of any of the 
"utensils of trade. 

Did you observe how well the livery of her servants is 
got up, not in the disposition of the colors perhaps, but in 
the workmanship ; it is (for her livery) unfortunately artistic, 
and seems as if especially intended to show the world the 
importance of that beautiful and useful art which is made 
subservient to the constructive properties of broadcloth and 
and beeswax. Ill-natured people say she need not get so 
easily enraged about trifles, since that if they were entirely 
ignorant of her origin, her style of manners and mind would 
give a clue which would not lead them far out of the way. 
Mrs. Ichabod Fustian is a vf oman of family, — not in the sense 
she would wish the world to understand by that expression 
— but a woman with a family of children, and (what many 
will learn with surprise for the first time) a husband, of 
whose existence, even by inuendo, Mrs. Fustian rarely, if 
ever, mentions. In fact, to all intents and purposes, so far 
as the public is concerned, Mr. Fustian is only a hypothetical 
husband, — a conjugal cipher of which no account has ever 
been made in the domestic calendar. In all calculations by 
the familly algebra he represents the *' unknown quantity." 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 21 

When Iclmbod Fustian, after serving his time faithfully, had 
established himself in a small, snug business, he thought it 
best to look for a partner for life that would advance his in- 
terests by economy and care ; and accordingly paid his 
addresses to Miss Fantail Freelove, who at that time (for 
reasons it is unnecessary to mention) was not disposed lo be 
over fastidious, if a fair chance should otfer. Mr. Fustian 
did not make beauty or education essential qualifications, 
but rather conceived that in the practical mind, and phj^^j^ 
vigor of the object of his choice, he had selected a peflj||F ->4I^ 
Avell adapted to preside at the washtub, or to subjugate a % • 
refractory family. Well, he found that he was not mistaken - 
in this respect. 

Mrs. F, proved a good worker and an excellent manager ; 
there were no emergencies to which her tact and energy 
were not equal. This lasted very well for some time ; things 
went on in the usual humdrum way, and Mr. F. began to 
think, after measuring his customers, and closing the store 
for the night, that he was something more than the ninth 
part of a man. But, alas, for Ichabod's felicity : it was , 
destined to be very short-lived. By the vicissitudes of trade, 
money began to pour in, and with it an ambition on the part 
of Mrs. F. to better her condition and gain a name among 
the people. Under her impulsive teachings, poor Ichabod 
became as plastic as the dough she kneaded. From that 
day to the present he has been but a household automaton, 
obhged to box his compass according to the chart laid down 
by his brawny spouse — forced in the outset to relinquish his 
egitimate sphere to which he was attached, to delve and 



22 NEW-YOEK aeistoceacy; oe, 

slave for means to support a system of life that lie thorough- 
ly abhorred, and for which he gets no sort of credit. 

Mrs. F. considers it of no consequence that he should be 
known as connected with any domestic enterprise. She has 
been known to speak of her husband to her visitors, as if 
giving a piece of news at which they must be delightfully 
astonished, and on the same occasion appeared highly 
flattered because her announcement was looked upon as 
merely a good joke. She finds him useful, and makes use 
of him ; keeps him busy at odds and ends, particularly as it 
keeps him out of sight. He gives orders for her entertain- 
ments and money for her to pay for them. On great occa- 
sions of state, he appears in an humble way ; never inter- 
fering by ill-timed officiousness ; he has been too well drilled. 

My reader wonders how on earth these people got so 
much in the world's eye. I will tell him. Mrs, Fustian 
knew (what doesn't she know in such matters) that she 
could not get where she aspired by a simple bravado of 
wealth or show of equipages ; that people then (though now 
the current seems to be setting just the other way) were to 
be approached more cautiously, and therefore her cards must 
be played accordingly. 

First, she must be seen occasionally in pleasant confi- 
dence with one or two whose patronage will be invaluable, 
to whom she must cringe and fawn, and play lickspittle to, 
in such a way as to impress the idea, that although she is 
socially nothing, it is a pity that a woman with so much tact 
and goodness of heart couldn't be brought forward. 

Step number two, must be a bold dash. Her house is 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 23 

to be established, her name to be spoken, and therefore a 
grand ball must be the baptism to consecrate her. Brown, 
the peerless Falstaff of Gotham, must scour the hotels for ^^ 
sojourning notables, sweep the cellars and attics for super- | 
annuated talent, and where the lion's skin is deficient, eke it : 
out with the ass's. Brown can do it ; and being consulted 
in '* trembhng hope," pronounces the undertaking feasible, 
and the bargain is concluded, by his offering, for sufficient 
and substantial considerations, to fill out the blanks from his 
own list. " Strike up drums, sound alarums," the invita- 
tions are out. Somebody asks who Mrs. Fustian is : a pa- 
tron answers, " go and see ;" and '' go and see" is short, and 
may imply a good deal. So it becomes a watchword, and 
people generously conclude to " go and see." A flourish 
of trumpets, a crush and its consequences, which Mrs. Fus- 
tian thinks dog cheap at $2500 or $3000, and the day is won. 
* Then comes the glory— oh ! such glory, and in the ful- 
ness of her gratitude, what will she not do for the world. 
She has been befriended, and must not be behindhand in 
■ acknowledgments. Her life now is but an echo of the world, 
into which she has just been born ; a tally stick on which 
all their sports are scored ; a leger in which all the pubUc 
follies are registered ; a waddling encyclopedia of the beau- 
monde ; a reflex in fan and feathers of fashionable jugglery. 

" And since the ricli in their own barges ride, 
(She) hires a boat and pukes in mimic pride." 

I intended in this chapter to have given Mr. FalstafF 
Brown a more extended notice, but have been prevented by 
the difficulty of conjoining, in a seemly manner, the bulk of 



2-i GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 

his portly person with the unhooped vastness of Mrs. Fus- 
tian. It would be almost as impossible for them to share 
and share alike in the same chapter, as it would to sit on the 
same chair, or dine off the same dish of meat — that is, if 
Mrs. F. retains that fearful appetite for which she has the 
credit. Brown is a splendid specimen of a successful sexton 
— a man of numberless callings and astonishing ubiquity. 
Besides attending to the rights and ceremonies of his partic- 
ular profession, he may be found engaged in a wondrous va- 
riety of lucrative occupations. Although chief conduc- 
tor at funerals, marriages, baptisms, etc., there is no one 
,whose reputation stands with his in arranging the costly pre- 
parations for festivities among those who have discovered 
that extravagance is sometimes accepted in lieu of " exclu- 
siveness." Ko one can look at Brown and not be convinced 
that he is a rising man, that, although he gives to so many 
that last allowance to humanity, " six feet of earth," he is 
himself on the high road to prosperity. He bears about him 
unmistakable evidences of good conscience and good cheer. 
Who but recalls the shrill whistle that makes an " open se- 
same" for arrivals by the last carriage, or the call for con- 
veyances of departing guests, in a voice that rivals perhaps 
the sonorous majesty with which the summons were given 
for the " last charge" at Waterloo. It is to be hoped that 
Brown may turn literary when he retires, and become com- 
municative. No one, I think it is safe to say, could tell such 
*' tales out of school." Let us hope that in his benevolence 
he will speak the secrets of his prison house, and enlighten 
the benighted people. 




Mr. Falstaff Brown, on his throne of" Grace,'" hdinonishes the wayfarer of 
the importance of dress. 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 25 



CHAPTEK ni. 

Nam ut quisque insanus nigris medium in impedUt crus 

Pellibus, et latum demisit pectore clavum, 

Audit coutinuo " Quis homo hie ?" et " Quo patre natus ?" 

[6th Chap. 1st Book of Horace's Satires. 

On the principle that an " ounce of prevention is better 
than a pound of cure," I hope to be pardoned for occupying a 
small space in entering a humble disclaimer. In order to 
avoid all possibility of misconstruction, as well as suspicions 
of every kind, I wish, before I go any farther, distinctly, and 
once for all, to avow my entire innocence of attempt at in- 
dividual portraiture, and to deprecate the suspicion of hav- 
ing any other motive in these imperfect etchings, than that 
of amusing myself by presenting society at large with a 
mirror, whose reflection shall be a truthful ** ensemble" of 
many things that an overweening pride would prevent them 
from observing — or if observing, from acknowledging. I 
intend to " set down nought in malice, nor aught extenuate." 
I shall illustrate classes by individuals, (fictitious ones, of 
course,) who, from being intensified specimens of the class 
to which they belong, render themselves conspicuously the 
objects of public interest and private speculation. Indeed 
I do not know but that it might be said that they are, to a 
certain extent, public property. I wish to show my cus- 
tomers the raw material, before art and labor shall have 
2 



26 NEW-YOEK aeistoceacy; oe, 

rendered it into a tissue of glossy silk. If Mr. Fustian made 
his appearance as a tailor, it was simply because it was an 
ordinary profession, and suited the man. He may have 
cobbled, or coopered, or carried a pack for all I care, but 
as he made his bow, shears in hand, there is no use in dis- 
guising him as a soldier. The story is told of some inge- 
nious gentleman, who, finding himself without a seat at the 
opera, forthwith put his head in the first circle, and pro- 
claimed in a loud voice that (I forget which, but it was 
either) Mr. Smith's, or Mr. Brown's, or Mr. Jones's house 
was on fire ; as might be expected, the announcement 
brought out a moiety of the audience, and our friend ob- 
tained the object in view. It is easy to see that the story 
was got up to show how many of the human family rejoiced 
in one or the other of the patronymics composing the above 
trinity. So Mr. Fustian was made a knight of the needle, 
instead of a knight of the cross, because the profession was 
chosen at random, and because it was a very honorable one. 
Indeed humanity would be but a naked affair without it. 
Although it's no disgrace that your grandfather was hung ; 
yet, like poverty, " it's devihsh inconvenient ;" and a com- 
mittee of tailors would no doubt pass resolutions to the ef- 
fect, that although a man's father was a tailor, he's the 
ninth part of a man for " a' that." 

" Honor and shame from no condition rise, 
(Sew) well your part, and where the honor lies." 

I have dwelt longer on this matter than was, perhaps, 
neccessary, or agreeable ; but have done so that hereafter I 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 27 

can paint in peace, when it is known that my embodiments 
are but the types of classes. If every one was hke Mrs. 
Fustian, it would be plain sailing, for she is too fond of no- 
toriety to care much how it is acquired, and is very well 
satisfied that her foibles and her family should be gazetted, 
even in equivocal terms. She has been known to crow over 
letters from watering places, in which were allusions that 
nothing but the most fearful self-sufficiency could torture 
into a compliment. Dry humor, or satirical irony, are all 
lost on this lady, it having been no part of her education 
to cultivate a delicate appreciation. But, alas, there is a 
class of people, cousins-german to Mrs. Fustian, who are 
her antipodes in the way of susceptibility — victims of a mis- 
erable, morbid sensitiveness-, resulting from ignorance, 
and a brooding apprehension as to the stability of their 
"locum tenens." In approaching this genus I am beset 
with many fears, lest, on an unexpected occasion, I should 
be taken to task by some Don Quixote of the fraternity, who 
fearful that he may be, or has been, the unconscious object 
of slight, determines to establish with the world a belief in 
the fastidiousness of his punctilio, by an extra assumption of 
captiousness. It is no small ajQFair to maintain even a de- 
cently amiable relation with such. You must jockey your- 
self down to a system of the most scientific control, and 
even then be prepared to be surprised at nothing. 

I can invent no theory to justify the creation of these 
unhappy mortals, unless they are to be included under that 
comprehensive assortment — necessary evils. As thisjs a 



28 



distinct species, and one offering many features that will re- 
pay careful study, I shall withhold my specimens, and pro- 
ceed with the instructive details of the Fustian family. I 
hate to leave those amiable persons — they combine so many 
strong traits, and present such a charming aggregate, that 
I am doubtful of obtaining any thing so complete in its kind, 
or of so recognizable a character. It is a study which so 
many will understand, not because of the justice I have 
done to it (though I flatter myself that it possesses some 
fidelity), but because since the Fustians dug their way to 
the light, it has been their constant aim to keep that fact so 
ostentatiously before the world, that there has been no such 
thing as forgetting it. 

It would have been bad tactics to have allowed the furor 
of a first advent to subside without turning it to some per- 
manent interest. You don't catch Mrs. Fustian making any 
such sad mistakes. She knows that although the splutter 
and dash with which she accompanies herself, is but " a 
much ado about nothing," that if she succeed, it will not 
be the first time that such means have given " a local habi- 
tation and a name." Do you suppose that a tactician of her 
stamp would miss the eclat of a pew at Grace Church, any 
more than that of a box at the Opera ? Did you ever know 
her violate etiquette so far as to be in her seat when the 
service commences ? or by underdressing the conventional 
standard appointed by the frequenters of that highly fashion- 
able and ornate temple ? It is customary of a fine Sunday, 
for Ichabod to precede by a sufficient time his delicate 



GEMS OF JAPONIC A-DOM. 29 

Spouse, that all luxurious appurtenances may be properly 
adjusted, and also as a kind of silent herald of her august 
approach. So, when he appears, he is regarded in the 
prophetical light of a sort of municipal St. John. Ichabod 
is accustomed to pioneering of all sorts, from that of pri- 
vate policemen at hotels, on the " qui vive" for itinerant 
nobility, to the pious sentinel of a Sunday. It is only those 
who have witnessed the spectacle of her sacred debut, that 
can really conceive of its dignity ; with a vanguard of sons 
and daughters, one is forcibly reminded of the grand entree 
which opens an equestrian performance. This scenic dis- 
play comes off generally about half an hour after things are 
started, when most of the frequenters are settled to their 
prayers or their naps, as the case may be. It is unques- 
tionably a great coup de (Grace) and by bad judges pro- 
nounced exceedingly vulgar. It is the same thing at the 
Opera, with a slight change of dress, and an increased de- 
votion of manner — -for, in both cases, it is hut mannerism. 
The probability is that if the fashions should change, neither 
place would be often honored, as the sacrifice would be 
small. I would recommend those who enjoy rich treats, to 
go and see the performance that takes place in Mrs. Fus- 
tian's box, *' it's as good as play" and better than a pill. It 
would take more space than the thing is worth to describe 
the whole of this exquisite farce ; but it may be seen at the 
usual price, two nights in the week, all through Opera 
season. 

Strangers who may have visited our Opera House during 



30 NEw-YOEK aristoceacy; oe, 

\hQ fashionable season (for be it known that persons of Mrs. 
Fustian's order, seldom think it worth while to attend any 
public amusement out of a prescribed time), can hardly have 
failed to have had their attention called to a certain part of 
the house by the frantic exhibitions of a very stout, hearty 
lady, who looks more like an over-dressed washer- woman 
than any thing else. To those who are unacquainted with 
her character, it would be difficult to divine what she is 
driving at, or what end she has in view. In the midst of 
Yerdi's heavenly cadences, when the house is rapt in 
breathless silence, this uninspired person is squirming and 
shuffling through a series of contortions, that suggest the 
idea more than any thing else, that she has had her feet 
suddenly immersed in a tub of very hot water, and been 
obliged to keep them there. One might suppose that she 
would tire of endeavors to call attention to her box, but it 
is quite the contrary. There are a regular series all through 
the evening, which neither the heavy artillery of *' Lom- 
bardi," or the light diversions of " II Barbiero De Seviglio," 
are able to subdue, commencing with a gentle display of 
smiles and nods, and manifestations of lace and cap strings, 
and increasing in alarming ratio till, with the head-gear in 
convulsions, the arms flaihng about, and the big fan going 
like a patent wind-mill, it ends in a grand climax of perspir- 
ing agony. It is very lucky for my lady, that there is such 
a thing as attraction of cohesion, or else she might find that 
rotations in full dress would be less deficate and more dan- 
gerous. Those in the farthest stage box, and the distant 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 31 

amphitheatre, are familiar with the stentorian power of a 
voice which exacts recognition by ignorant remarks and ill- 
timed plaudits — that voice which reminds ns of the scold- 
ing cooks, whom we have just discharged. Mrs. Fustian 
conciliates visits to her private box, and if successful, never 
fails in some peculiar and energetic way, to call public atten- 
tion to that fact. She plays to the audience quite as much 
as the gentlemen on the stage, and as for taste in music or 
any fondness for the intrinsic beauty of sweet sounds, she 

confessed to the Duke of in a grateful effusion after 

an invitation to visit his Italian villa, that she cared more for 
mutton. The Duke would never intentionally have be- 
trayed the confidence, but one day after dinner, at the ]^ew- 
York Hotel, when the wine was in and the wit out, he made 
a clean breast of the whole thing. As for the lady's con- 
fession, any one who has seen her dexterity at lamb and 
mint sauce, will entertain little doubt but that she meant 
what she said about mutton. There was another little cir- 
cumstance connected with musical matters, which some- 
what, though very slightly, confused Mrs. Fustian, and 
amused the spectators. As a general thing she takes the 
cue from others, when she applauds, and " comes down" 
with the house ; yet occasionally, for the sake of establish- 
ing her claims, as a capable critic, she electrifies the assem- 
blage with a terrific battery of "bravas" and bravos" 
when the quorum of connoisseurs are enjoying the calm in- 
terregnum that marks the transition from one fine point to 
another. Unluckily for her reputation, as an Italian scholar. 



32 NEW-YOEK AEISTOCRACY ; OE, 

she ** hravas'^ Edgardo, and " hmvos'* Lucia, -witli other 
mistakes, which even the confidential instruction of the 
pohshed Duke has been unsuccessful in eradicating. Mrs. 
Fustain is not of a temperament to be much annoyed by 
such trifles (for trifles she deems them), and returns with 
interest the satirical aim of Mrs. Musky 's opera glass, who 
is the leader of the "fur faction" — looks defiance at the 
" pack pedler chque" — smiles sardonically at the " note 
shaving" set, and actually points her finger contemptuously 
at the " small potato paddy" party, all of whom she regards 
with supreme contempt, and turning to her protege, Bob 
Brokendown (a perfect Japonica ** jamb noir"), remarks in 
such bad French that I forego an imitation : ** n'iraporte, 
pauvre parvenus, je les pleins" — to which Bob replies, " c'est 
bien vrai, Madame, ils sent jaloux, c'est tout." 

This young gentleman is an important personage with 
Mrs. Fustian. He is her confidential stool-pigeon, general 
decoy duck, and matrimonial whipper in. His genealogical 
tree goes back perhaps a half generation further than that 
of his patroness, before the branch of manual labor, from 
which he is a shoot, appears. Between these two there 
subsists a condition of reciprocal interests, that at the first 
acquaintance was the means of producing the alliance, and 
maintaining between them an unbroken and well understood 
free-masonry. It was a union for mutual convenience, and 
the copartnership has existed without a thought of dissolu- 
tion. Bob Brokendown was among those who assisted Mrs. 
Fustian to bury her reminiscences of shop and shears by 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 33 

eating her dinners- and patronizing her parties. For this he 
had two good reasons, one of which would have heen quite 
sufficient to have authorized the confederacy : first, to assist 
from a feehng of sympathy, this ambitious lady to the 
honors of an aristocratic maternity, reminded no doubt of 
the struggles of his own " aspiring house," while the bul- 
lion lay waiting for the government stamp. I am sorry that 
I cannot say that the other reason, though by far the most 
cogent, was equally disinterested. However, in my next 
chapter, the reader will have an opportunity of drawing his 
own conclusions. 



34 ISTEW-YORK AJRISTOCEACY ; OE, 



CHAPTEE lY. 

Redicuhim acri 
Fortius, et melius, magnas plerumquc secat res. 

10th Sat. of Hor. lib .1. 

Agreeably to the promise that closed my last chapter, 
I shall proceed to distribute the biographical tit-bits rela- 
ting to that interesting young gentleman, Mr. Brokendown, 
who may be taken as a fair sample of the particular pet 
lambs among what I prefer calling the ''Flat Foot Aristoc- 
racy." The term " codfish," I know, is the one now in vogue, 
and perhaps at one time was the most appropriate that 
could be used ; but there is an easterly twang about the 
expression, which should have kept it sacredly " salted 
down" for the exclusive benefit of the Lynn shoemakers 
V and the "higher law" Bostonians. Flat foot is very com- 
prehensive, and tolerably significant, as will be seen by con- 
sulting the catalogues which I intend to publish. There 
are such a number as would properly come under that clas- 
sification, that I shall find it somewhat difficult to know 
where to commence. 

However, we'll think of that on the way, and now for 

f our hopeful charge. Bob was a fast man, and foreseeing, 

with that clairvoyance peculiar to fast men, that he was in 

a fair way to find his way out of the lane, long as it had 




^E^ ^^=^^^:^^^_ ac/^y* 



Bob, in a Gambling Saloon, obtains the loan of a dollar from the Duke. 



GEMS OF JAPONIC A-DOM. 35 

been, he wisely turned his attention to securing such inte- 
rests as it would be pleasant to know of, when he should be 
obliged to retire on " half pay," or under the necessities of 
general insolvency. You may be sure when a man makes 
such provisions, it will not be very long before those contin- 
gencies occur which will render it agreeable to avail himself 
of them. And thus it came to pass, by due course of " faro" 
" high-low-jack," " vingt-et-un,' ' and a '' two-forty" gait gen- 
erally, that Mr. Bob found it very conveniently economical 
to fall upon those '' reserved rights," which his former di- 
plomacy had secured with Mrs. Fustian, and with whom he 
now negotiated in a manner which he hoped would hum- 
bug the world to believe, was entirely attributable to his 
consciousness that that lady's real position was such as to 
require a deferential style of approach. 

The two sinners know what they are about though, and 
the compact is made without anybody but the world being 
much cheated. In exchange for being put on the ** free 
list," our respected friend binds himself by tacit, though 
solemn indentures, to become a useful and incorruptible 
attache, rendering all the varied and pohte offices consistent 
with genteel sycophancy. He is as much " Garcon" as 
*' Blacky" who hands up your card, and only lacks livery to 
make a respectable servitor, and " ffall to make oppression 
bitter." His services are multiform, and often attended with 
considerable difficulty ; but his talents seem now to have 
found their proper sphere, and he assumes the baton with 
the dignity of a Field Marshal. The Duke, who taught 



S6 NEW-TOEK aeistockacy; oe, 

him a trick or two in pasteboard, to the tune of a few thou- 
sands, is quite amazed at the metamorphose, and pronounces 
him as clever as the bandit valet, who keeps his " villa" in 
order, while he plucks a few pigeons to sustain the expenses 
incurred by his stay in American society. Neither can Mrs. 
Fustian refuse the meed of praise to such speedy profici- 
ency, and feels, after all, that she has not paid too extrava- 
gantly for the unexceptionable "ton" which Bob has im- 
parted to her whole establishment. 

Again, when Madam or daughters are obliged to play 
wall flowers (a not unfrequent occurrence) at balls, at the 
Springs, or the Opera, this facile gentleman's voluntary at- 
tentions divert a critical observance of such fact, and take 
off the wiry edge of mortification. Belonging to the 
*' dancing dervishes," and an accomplished one at that; his 
business is, in case Miss Eudocia is likely to have no chance 
for the next set, to lead out that skinny nymph, and hug 
her vigorously " secundum artem," and in case of her feel- 
ing greatly overcome by the ^^res5wre and ^;as520«, which 
one would judge was the attractive feature of our approved 
Polka, "etid omne genus' he drops her by mamma, and sends 
for an ice. At supper time he has the responsible charge 
of ministering to the capricious longings of Miss Eudocia, 
and the formidable requirements of her more capacious and 
less fastidious mamma. 

I could not truthfully relate the feats in gastronomy 
performed by this lady, without incurring some little skepti- 
cism, and perhaps the Suspicions of the incredulous, that I 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 37 

had a very free imagination ; so, I will let the ungrateful 
task alone, and if any one is curious to get some statistical 
information, I refer such to the unfailing memory and cease- 
less tattle of Dr. Magpie, to whom I shall not fail of intro- 
ducing my readers more particularly at a future period. 
Again, at the opera, in case of the Duke's, or Count Nut- 
meg's absence (the laundress of these gentlemen sometimes 
refusing further credit, retains a " lien" on their hnen, caus- 
ing thereby the disruption of sundry engagements, unfore- 
seen). Bob stands in " milady's" stall conspicuously, and pro- 
ceeds to operate gracefully on the first and second row, 
with a beautifully enamelled glass, but of remarkably small 
power, a souvenir of Madam's, designed much more to be 
seen than to see through. 

There was a time, and not very remote, when he had a 
better glass, which with several other articles of some little 
value, after making sundry calls on his " Uncle," paid a final 
visit from which it never returned, having become incorpo- 
rated in the promiscuous properties constituting the estate 
of that hospitable old gentleman. Or, if he sees a modest 
young man hanging about the lobbies, evidently too diflSdent 
to encounter, without encouragement, such ''amass of fash- 
ion and a howl of form ^^ he tips him a wink, which being 
" as good as a nod to a blind horse", brings the fledgling 
with a flutter to the box, who soon finds that (intellectually, 
though not in this case physically) he is not the first one 
whose imagination has made " mountains of molehills." 
This being done. Bob, with a feeling of infinite relief, es- 



38 NEw-YOEK aeistoceacy; oe, 

capes to mingle in the gossip of his set or participate in the 
slang and bad brandy of the bar-room. He amuses himself, 
(the hypocrite) by strolling through the different chques ini- 
mical or rival to the one whose mistress he serves, and acting 
as a vagabond spy, he ferrets out and retails the intelligence 
acquired by a quick eye and an acute ear. He ensconces 
himself by the side of Mrs. Japhet Blowhard, a tender 
shoot taken from the branch of the " Small Potato" party, 
and grafted matrimonially on an unknown stock — from this 
source he obtains little but brogue and bad grammar. He 
stops a moment, also, with Mrs. Lavender, who, with her 
family, constitute the only specimens there are of the " note 
shaving" upper ten. This lady is remarkably astute and pene- 
trating. She has her attaches, but they are retained about 
her person for more sentimenal purposes, and by more en- 
ticing arguments, than ever crossed the mind of Bob when 
he entered service. She is not to be hoodwinked by trai- 
torous gallantries, and " Arnold" passes on with the uncom- 
fortable consciousness of a man that has been caught in the 
act. 

Thence he saunters to spend a few moments with the 
occupants of Mrs. Musky 's box, a paragon of pickled 
politeness, but being given to cauterizing individuals of Bob's 
calibre, he retires as soon as may be with unfavorable im- 
pressions regarding that lady's style of conversation, but 
obliged to admire her extravagance in jewels and brocade. 
Mrs. Musky being the chief representative of the blended 
dynasties of the "milk cart" and *' fur" factions, and des- 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 39 

tined to be distinguished by a full length portrait, I would 
call a careful attention to the lights and shades contained in 
her picture. Not thinking it worth while to " potter" with 
the " pack pedlers," or distress himself unnecessarily with 
sickening pap, which awaits the luckless wight that stum- 
bles on the " pluck-and-liver, thread-and-needle" sofa, he 
returns to his kennel in time to conduct his charge to the 
crush-room, where he blankets them against the dangers 
which a violent change might produce on such delicate con- 
stiutions. In case of no proffered escort, he usually accom- 
panies them home, and as they seldom indulge in the luxu- 
ry of a hot supper (that species of extravagance being 
mostly accorded to the beloved public), he happens in by 
way of consolation at some gilded hell, where, with the as- 
sistance of a bottle or two of the best sporting brand, he 
fortifies himself for the excitement with which he intends 
to lose his last dollar — a kindly loan from the Duke, in re- 
collection of the liberal manner in which Bob " came down" 
for professional instructions. We shall not pretend to fol- 
low in the wake of this victim of infatuation, when inflamed 
with wine and good luck, or desperate with the agony of 
the loss of his little all, he abandons himself to those grosser 
dissipations, from the momentary oblivion of which he shall 
be wakened on the morrow to the aggravated tortures of 
remorse and bodily prostration. How many, ! reader, 
from those we know, are leading this existence day in and 
day out ! and how many, with as fair chances of long life 



40 NEW-TOEK aeistoceacy; oe, 

as ourselves, have passed away suddenly and gone down to 
the dust ! 

Of the many vicious passions that grow with rank pro- 
fusion in the human heart, can one be pointed out which 
holds the faculties in such absolute despotism, as that which 
burns and festers in the bosom of an habitual gambler ? By 
its awful impulses. Nature lives in constant outlawry with 
herself — humanity is made a mockery and byword — the sa- 
cred ties of blood are dissolved, and virtue, honor and truth 
are regarded but as the fictitious creations of a crude phi- 
losophy, or a diseased fancy. Look at that pale, bloodless, 
broken wreck, that creeps tremblingly — that incarnation of 
the " confessions of an opium eater" — do you recognize in 
his blasted form, bowed with premature old age, in that 
face seamed with many a deep-cut line of woe, and lit with 
the ghastly flame of unholy passions, the likeness of one 
who was illustrious in promise and family, with a splendor 
of qualities and nobility of form, that gave the " world as- 
surance of a man ?" No ! Ay, but it is so. That man 
moves and breathes and has his being in our midst — and to 
me he looks like a transparent sepulchre, through which 
the loathsome corruptions are revealed, or as a green flick- 
ering phosphoric light, hung as a beacon to warn off" the 
unthinking from the yawning abyss over which it is sus- 
pended. But what has this to do with Bob ? Perhaps 
more than he thinks. Let him profit by the " coming 
events that cast their shadows before." Besides, it was 
little episode, I thought there could be no harm in ; and 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 41 

when Mrs. Fustian sees it, I hope she will be induced to 
read Bobby a private lecture. 

To tell the -truth, Mrs. F. troubles herself little enough 
about such small matters as the moral qualifications of her 
associates. Her ethics, if she have any, are sufficiently libe- 
ral to please the most enlightened latitudinarian. What does 
she care for the abstract principles of virtue, of truth, of 
modesty, unless they put money in (her) purse, or afford 
her some kind of eclat ? and she is pretty well aware of 
living in an age when such qualities command but small 
premiums. Her creed, civil and religious, is a profound 
faith in the infallibility of Mammon ; her decalogue, in the 
best paying investments ; and her prayers, supplications for 
the golden rod with which she may waive her enemies into 
awe and insignificance. She has devoted much time, and 
her best talents, to the study of domestic and financial 
economy, and a digest from her of these particular topics 
would be an acquisition of much practical value. If she pos- 
sesses one talent which is above another, it is that by which 
she is enabled to make the greatest display, at the least 
actual cost. It would be well for the public, feasting and 
making merry at Mrs. Fustian's expense, to remember how 
hard the subsequent pinchings and retrenchments will come 
down on that " unknown quantity," poor Ichabod. If you 
should ever chance to obtain his confidence, ask him how 
far the remnants of a large ball have carried him, before he 
was allowed to sit down to a freshly prepared meal. I 
merely venture on this little bit of gossip, to show that " all 



4:2 NEW-YORK aristocracy; or, 

is not gold that glitters," and as an anodyne to allay the 
smarting jealousy of envying outsiders. Bob's most confi- 
dential position, however, is as matrimonial agent. This 
makes it necessary for him to frequent the courts of probate, 
and be very sweet on the county Surrogate. He must keep 
up his acquaintance with large contractors in real estate, 
court the ready money capitalists, and have a.sharp eye on 
the heavy holders of fancy stocks. Besides, he must lounge 
about fashionable hotels in the city or at watering places, 
and make accidental acquaintances with verdant nabobs, 
who, learning that he has the entree, put their leading 
strings into his hands. He is an obliging cicerone, eats their 
dinners, gambles with their money, and damns them behind 
their back. To qualify himself for these delicate diploma- 
cies, he reads " Izaac Walton" attentively, and gleans pre- 
cepts from the standard works of ichthyology, divining that 
a knowledge of piscatory psychology will give him vantage 
ground, when he comes to whip the stream for veteran 
trout. 

At first Mrs. Fustian had a raging mania for the ** no- 
bility," as the kind of metal that would make the telling 
weights in the social scale ; but being on one or two occa- 
sions severely done for by the " counterfeit presentment," 
and from subsequent convictions that there was no ostensi- 
"^Iq aristocracy but that of dollars, she has drawn ofi" in favor 
of the latter. Still she has the good sense to keep two 
strings to her bow, and if it be possible, strives for those 
alliances where there is a junction of birth (not that 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 43 

which comes from a revered ancestry, education, refined 
habits and associations, but a sort of anomalous, pre- 
scriptive birth, that has bought with gold the suffrages of 
one generation) and fortune, and in that way kill her two 
birds with one stone. With a logic peculiar to certain class- 
es, she places gentility within geographical limits, and 
would most likely take you for a noodle, should you ad- 
vance that civilization did exist south of Bleecker Street. 
Entertaining local ideas of this nature, you may perhaps 
conceive the approbation with which she expresses herself 
of Waverly Place, the aspirations she breathes to Union 
Park, and the positive awe with which she regards Fifth 
Avenue. 

"We will now lay Mrs. Fustian on the shelf, a position 
which she dislikes above all others, but one to' which she 
is eventually destined, needles, shears, " goose" and all. If 
we have occasion to make use of her, she shall be taken 
down and unrolled, like a bale of mixed goods. It is difficult 
to crowd such a woman, or her descriptions, into a small 
space, and I am sorry that my limits will not allow me to 
continue her description, even if, in doing so, I should be 
giving (in the elegant phraseology of Mrs. Rensit of the 
butcher aristocracy) " too much pork for a shilling." 

I had intended to have postponed the appearance of the 
medical celebrity to whom I shall now have the pleasure of 
introducing the reader ; but the opportunity of presenting 
him in connection with the '' dust brush," which we have 



just hung up, is so tempting, that I have shifted shghtly 
the order of the play, and shall let him in at a private door. 
In drawing the peculiarities of this disciple of Galen, I hope 
the city generally will not accuse me of having, reference to 
each one's family physician. The particular subject I am 
dealing with, is the private adviser of no stated number of 
people, but a " family physician," in certain senses of the 
word, to the whole city, or at least that part of it " above 
Bleecker." Dr. Magpie, as long as most of us are willing 
to allow that we can remember, has been known to be of 
that harmless age that may be any where between the gap 
of thirty-five and sixty-five. Indeed so well is he pre- 
served, that those who are familiar with his standing as a 
practitioner, conclude that he never could have prescribed 
for his own ailments. Had he administered to himself the 
doses of quackery and slanderous gossip that his patients 
have taken, a prolific source of petty abominations w^ould 
have oozed out and exhausted themselves a long time ago. 
If a botanist were called on to make out the doctor's clas- 
sification, he would, beyond a doubt, place him on the cata- 
logue of herbal anomalies as a cross between garlic and the 
cactus — the former being supposed to symbolize the atmos- 
pheric taint with which his presence infects all persons and 
places, while the latter with its longevity, its tiers of thorns, 
its utter uselessness, and a lack of the active principle of 
evil, completes the similitude. As a public man, I am per- 
mitted to take a sly glance as he passes in the street, and 
somehow I voluntarily associate him with the gray-haired 



GEMS OP JAPONICA-DOM. 45 

prickly exotics which one meets with, displayed in httle 
shiny Britannia- ware pots, on the window-sills of houses in 
the dark, dismal streets running near the river. I have 
often thought that the doctor must feel singularly, if he ever 
indulges in a self- review ; and that it must strike him as 
strange that he is not undergoing a state of gradual phys- 
ical decomposition. One would think that a half a century 
of exertions hke his, would exhaust vitality to the very toes ; 
that the inner elements of "toil and trouble," which have 
been so long and so continually seething, would make a 
porous exit, and be dissipated in " thin air ;" but no, like 
parchment, he seems to become indurated by time. If any 
body should ever discover perpetual motion, the doctor's 
body is the very kind of material in which the power might 
be safely illustrated. In case of sudden casualty (which 
from some unexplainable cause, seldom befalls such peo- 
ple), I hope the dctor ohas a provisional clause in his will, 
whereby the anomalous anatomy of his body may be sub- 
mitted for the scientific inspection of those celebrated carv- 
ers of cold " wittles'' Drs. Mott and Stevens. Perhaps, 
over the body of this *' martyred monster," the College of 
Physicians and Surgeons, and the Academy of Medicine, 
would shake hands, and in view of so noble a sacrifice for 
the good of the profession, mutually agree to banish the 
jealousies, the cliques, the discord of the past, and hence- 
forth strive only for a unity of faith, and the establishment 
of truth. I hope Dr. Dixon will approve the idea, and if 



46 NEW-YORK AEISTOCEACY ; OE, 

there be occasion, press its importance through the columns 
of his amusing and instructive journal. The moral charac- 
ter of Magpie will, hkely, be sufficiently understood by the 
time the chapter is finished ; and as in the case of servants 
about whom we are a little doubtful, it is better that on par- 
ticular points nothing at all should be said. By the way, 
talking about servants, what a consummate valet de chamhre 
our doctor would have made in the days of Charles the 2nd 
or George the " Magnificent," or in courts as celebrated for 
their virtuous character. No doubt my readers by this 
time think that they have found out who I mean, and are 
only waiting to show the chicken they have hatched. Thus 
it is ever, that the types of classes are appropriated accord- 
ing to diversity of human imagination, to the familiar out- 
lines of some individual sinner. Would you know for what 
this man has lived, and moved, and had his being ? Would 
you learn his ruling passion, the ambition that has made, 
and makes him a toiling slave for the world ? Hark ! as he 
greets his professional brother in the sick room, ay, in the 
room perchance, which adjoins the chamber where life's 
sands are running low, or the hurried colloquy in street 
meetings, or salutations at balls, at breakfast or in bar-rooms, 
at churth or the opera ! The love of gossip is above and 
before every thing else. The mania for being the first to 
herald the miseries of others, and to retail and invent such 
spicy slanders as may add new laurels to the very unenvia- 
ble reputation he already possesses on that score. This is 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 47 

his aim, his occupation, his delight; and for this has he tied 
himself in the unworthy bondage that will last with his life. 
The doctor very much fancies hotel practice, and when ush- 
ered by " Boots" to the invalid's apartment, the keen sur- 
veillance both in ascent and descent, from attic to office, de- 
clare that he is combining his favorite pursuit with the mis- 
sion to suffering humanity. Perhaps he will stop for a 
glance in the public parlor, and one moment of rapid sur- 
vey will furnish his prurient imagination with stuff suffi- 
cient to spin a score of infamous slanders. You may meet 
him any where, and before the shake of hands is fairly over, 

he will ask you if you have heard that is a ruined 

man, or that Miss was seen walking with Mr. 

before breakfast, heavily veiled, around the fountain in 
Union Square, or that " Young America" had run off and 
married the chamber-maid ? So completely is he car- 
ried away by this muddy current of meddling, that it is 
by no means unfrequently the case that he will illustrate 
the fact that there is but one step from the sublime to the 
ridiculous, by perhaps commencing with embellishments on 

some grand flare-up in Place, and wind up with a 

sober narrative of the extraordinary adventures of your 
" grandmother's cat." Shakspeare says : — 

" For nought upon the earth doth live, 
But to the earth some special good doth give." 

But, for the life of me, I am unable to see the wisdom 
of that dispensation which has saddled society with this 



48 NEW-YOKK aeistockacy; oe, 

gossiping old maid. Beware of your converse in his pre- 
sence; regard Lim as a portable telegraph with brass 
wires, that is constantly sending off the odds and ends of 
social tittle-tattle, and so may you be tolerably safe from 
the venom of a tongue, 

"That will not spare a friend to spoil a joke." 




M, and M,.. Mu»Uy ..e couvinced .hat ra,nily portrait arc somcU,,.. 
• ■ disagreeably suggestive. 



Gi'::\rs of jAroNicA-DOM. 49 



CHAPTER Y. 

Licet superbus arabiiles pecunia, 

Fortuna non mutat genus. 
Videsne, sacram metiente te viam 

Cum vis, ter ulnaru in toga 
Ut ora vertat hue et hue euntium 

Liberrima indignatio ? 

[Hor. 5th lib., ith ode. 

As I proceed to add to my gallery of illustrious snobs, 
with here and there an original from the old masters, some 
idle curiosity perhaps may arise among those most likely to 
be interested, how these studies were obtained, and whether 
the artist has painted from life as he has seen it, or only by 
the descriptions of others, and the aids of private judgment. 
Alas ! I am but " a looker on here in Venice" — too poor in 
purse and too humble in position to even indulge a hope 
that I can be admitted among the elect, much less cherish 
an ambition to that end. I am, however, highly honored 
in the kindly condescension of two or three gentlemen who 
have taken their degrees, and from whom I have received 
many valuable statistics. Let me take this opportunity to 
acknowledge my indebtedness to them " for past favors, and 
beg a continuance of the same." Besides these sources of 
information, I possess another, of a most unusual and a 
magical description, that has been handed down for many 
generations as a precious heirloom. The original family 

3 



50 



possessor, I am candid enough to avow, was neither huno- 
nor transported ; — facts that I fear will destroy his chances 
for posthumous sympathies with the great unwashed, who 
very properly have a just scorn for any rascally aristocrat 
whose orrandfather died in his bed. '^ '^ '^ This ofift is 
neither more nor less than a most admirably constructed 
" Orrery," which, instead of being used for astronomical 
studies, I make subservient in my fourth-story pigeon-hole, 
to the display of sublunary constellations, and the compli- 
cated movements of the whole social system. I never write 
without it is by me, where I can appeal to its truthful 
teachings, and regard it as a faithful friend and instructor, 
and an -unfailing source of amusement. 

When I hear of, or meet with one of the worms of an 
hour, my globous monitor shows me unerringly the hole it 
occupied, and the intelligence thus obtained has often sur- 
prised my good friend , a son of one of our most 

distinguished judges. is a quiet, shrewd gentle- 
man, exceedingly agreeable to his immediate friends, but 
with a remarkable 2^^^'^chant for things of the "ancient 
regime," which is little calculated to make him popular 
with the world. Possessing a singular tenacity of memory, 
he is enabled to embellish his conversation with most dis- 
agreeable reminiscences, and being prone to a biting style of 
colloquy, it is somewhat amusing to watch the effect of his 
stories amongst a promiscuous company — hitting out right 
and left, yet, with such apparent innocence, that nobody 
seems inclined to seek a subject of quarrel. With his gen- 



GEMS OF JAPONIC A-DOM. 51 

erous assistance, I liave been able to unravel some knotty 
points indeed. The geography of Manhattan is to him like 
the ABC, and he tells me who once lived here, who died 
there, what districts were formerly somebody's farms, who 
drove four-in-hand and who rode in milk carts, who mended 
breeches or made barrels, who slaughtered cattle, or did a 
small business in thread and needles, who peddled skins, or 
shaved chins, who were on the box and who were cabin- 
boys, who were head carpenters, and who invested in hells, 
who were in the p-litterino- tin trade, and who umbrellas 

framed, 

" Curs of low degree, 

Jew and Gentile, bond and free." 

These are a few of the trades, and but a few. Having 
no tradesman's dictionary for reference, I am obliged to be 
satisfied with a limited range. Of course there are those 
about whom nothing is known, and probably never will be, 
which perhaps is quite as well. In all societies, and more 
especially large cities, is found a secretion of adventurers, 
whose appearance is as little to be accounted for, as any of 
the other phenomena of nature. They always exist in the 
purlieus of fashionable civilization, swelling the vampire 
crowd attracted by the " golden calf," as buzzards swarm 
in the horizon when a poor wretch is turning to carrion on 
the highway. But what have we to do with such paltry 
swindlers, when gigantic impostors are calling us with pom- 
pous effrontery to view their brazen idols ? 

Draw that shutter half to — the light is too strong ; now 



52 



pull down the shade a trifle ; there, what an agreeable and 
subdued tone is communicated to Mrs. Mu(Jsky's picture. 
Indeed, I am half sorry she isn't here to see the tasteful 
disposition herself. There is no one who likes to appear in 
a becoming light more than she does, and if practice makes 
perfect, she ought to be an adept at the toilet. What a 
pity, though, when she so often studies her glass, that she 
so seldom holds the " mirror up to nature'' Yet we can- 
not refrain from admiring her as a specimen of art, as one 
who understands the value of cotton and cosmetics, and who 
displays in her own person the science of milliner}^, and all 
those nameless delusions and innocent trickeries that belong 
to female ingenuity. But then she uses her knowledge as 
she should, rightly understanding that the greatest artist is 
he who in managing his subject, though accepting the assist- 
ance of Art, yet so skilfully conceals it as to produce what 
is most in accordance with Nature. Mrs. M. has been tho- 
roughly educated to her favorite system. No pains or ex- 
pense have been spared in giving her finished instruction. 
Early impressed with the importance of rendering her per- 
son as acceptable as possible, she has long regarded affairs 
of this nature, not only as a conventional requirement, but as 
a positive duty. Commencing with such principles, and 
with her full share of that innate vanity, which is confined to 
neither sex, it is not to be wondered at that she should be 
engrossed in those pursuits which formed her earliest ambi- 
tion, and are now the absorbing subject of thought and 
conversation, the distraction of her time, and the sum total 



GEMS OF JAPONIC A-DOM. 53 

of her happiness. A habit thus early formed, and rehgious- 
ly abided by, hke all habits that jump with inclination, has 
grown to a controlling passion. It has encircled her with 
resistless influences, enslaved her with strong prejudices, 
and exacts ministrations as imperious as the physical neces- 
sities of our nature. "While yet in short dresses she was 
articled to masters and mistresses, w4io might force by hot- 
bed process to fearful precocity these fruits, the seeds of 
which, were they left to Nature's kindly development, would 
have expanded to healthful maturity, bringing forth a hun- 
dred fold. But, alas ! for this human horticulture, the gar- 
den may smile awhile with the blush of roses, and the vio- 
lets eclipse the gold and purple of Solomon, still seek we 
vainly the former's fragrance, and mourn that the latter have 
lost their modesty. 

" Fie ou't ! O fie ! 'tis an 'jinweeded garden 
Tiiat grows to seed ; " 

Although roses are supposed to "smell as sweet under 
any other name," there is no reason to infer that any inter- 
est or sympathy can be expected for people who appear in 
print without a pedigree. It would be like giving a check 
without the signature, or paying one's fare and forgetting 
the ticket — since the check would be worth nothing, and 
without the ticket you couldn't come aboard. So I "vvill 
fill you up a check, with Mrs. Musky 's sign manual, for 
which you will please .give her a ticket, and let her come 
aboard. Without her heraldic registry, dear reader, I know 



\ 



54c NEW-YORK akistockacy; oe, 

she would be to you a wretched nondescript — that hke Sh' 
Charles Coldstream, after a laborious ascent to look into 
the volcano's crater, you would find *' nothing in it," besides 

it being ''d fatiguing." Worse than all, how should 

I meet that lady after so unpardonable a neglect. She 
would (and very properly) drop this work in disgust to find 
that in a history professing to be faithful, the inmates of her 
family had been slighted. And this is the apology, if one 
is needed (which I don't think is the case), why I have taken 
great pains to satisfy the wishes of the old families, by being 
very particular and ample in describing ancient associations, 
romantic traditions, and professions, coats of arms, devices, 
mottoes, and whatever else is worthy of special note. In 
this I am actuated by a kind motive to give all possible pub- 
licity to whatever is calculated to afford increased dignity 
and importance, and am candid to say, that for such dis- 
interested benefits I am entitled to their everlasting grati- 
tude. 

Probably Debrett has made one of those unpardonable 
omissions, which the most accurate writers are sometimes 
guilty of, or else I have an imperfect edition, for nowhere 
in the Peerage is mention made of the name or armorial 
bearings of the Musky family. Better people to be sure 
have been obliged to be satisfied with the extraction assigned 
them by publications of a more recent date, but it was wan- 
ton cruelty (if done purposely) to have withheld from a 
family, who, in their own estimation at least, are the cream 
of the '* uppers," the coveted honors of an ancient deriva- 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 55 

tion. Unfortunately for the glories of our race, the duties 
of the historian are inexorable. Were it not for their odious 
trick of fidehty, how easy to cover our names with unfading- 
glories, and bind our brows with perennial chaplets. 

But, my dear Mrs. INI., reconcile yourself to these trials, 
and say as did your lamented progenitor, when he upset his 
can, " there is no use in crying over spilt milk ;" and since 
Debrett has given you the slip, I will lend you the benefit 
of a charitable imagination. Careful calculations have un- 
folded me your horoscope, and henceforth, thanks to the aid 
of the occult sciences, your natal star shall shine lustrously 
amid the constellations that form the "milky way." If the 
derivation appear somewhat apocryphal, the same may be 
said of pagan gods, 

" Whom Tasso wept, and Homer sung;" 

and the next best thing to truth being poetry, we conclude 
by analogism that there may be subjects about which there 
is " more truth than poetry." Shades of our fathers ! what 
would the Avorld exclaim, if the spirits of departed butter- 
milk should revisit the scenes of their earthly prilgiimage. 
Think of the consternation of an irruption on the avenue by 
the clabbered souls of whey-faced ghosts, with spectral 
carts and fearful sounds of clanking cannikins ! Ye recipients 
of dollars from ancestral dairies, let gratitude inspire modes- 
ty, nor by disdain of paternal honors, draw down the hatred 
of vengeful Penates. 

Let us leave figures and, descend to prose. Mrs. M., as 



56 NEW-YOEK aeistoceacy; oe, 

a maiden, was necessitated to allow to her fathers a very 
diluted share of renown. Her venerated progenitor had as 
httle ambition to alter the prospects of his family as he had 
to change his paying customers, to whom he furnished 
daily supphes of milk, lactean treasures from the herd pas- 
tured on his own farm. 

Shrewd and enterprising, he bought in districts where 
he knew the tide of prosperity would deposit its golden 
drifts ; it might not be in bis day or generation, but sticking 
his stakes and pitching his tent, he calmly waited the issue 
of his venture. The realizations came sooner than he ex- 
pected, and ere he was called to his fathers the unexampled 
rise in city property gave him the plentiful harvest of his 
speculations. Some may imagine that the honors of re- 
spectable citizenship would be all that his descendants might 
desire ; but it was very difi^rent. With the means came 
the desire to banish the heritage of skim milk, and to adopt 
the wise plan of buttering the bread on both sides. The 
snake was only " scotched, not killed," and after due de- 
hberation, it was thought best to join fortunes with one 
whose wealth should be the first consideration, and whose 
rcnvness would render subjection easy. The family ballot 
was imanimous in selecting Milly (Mrs. M.'s maiden name) 
to this arduous post. Besides a natural aptitude to the cha- 
racter of a flirting financier, this young lady was supposed 
to unite in her person a species of artificial beauty, with the 
most consummate knoAvledge of female legerdemain. I 
may think it worth w^hile, before I have finished this exhi- 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 57 

bition, to relate a few facts in evidence of lier " tour de 
force." The poor gentleman who thus became the object 
of this family consjDiracy was as perfect a *' Simon Pure," as 
one would wish to get hold of, to victimize easily. Brought 
up in studied seclusion from woman and her w^ays, and de- 
prived of even such wisdom as may be picked up among 
men of the world, what could be expected of him, when 
encompassed by the wiles of a designing siren ? Who 
was there to tell him that he might fall, as many more as- 
tute than him, in gaping man-traps, or whisper him, beware 
of cunningly contrived gins ? miere were his ''good-na- 
tured" friends when these perils were imminent ? 

I fear, under such circumstances, men have no friends. 
It is strange that there ai'e such inconsistencies on this point. 
You will find those very persons who would give their last 
copper to a destitute friend, or wade through fire to shield 
him from danger, yet unmovedly watch the same, when 
threatened with a calamity Avhich is perpetual — see him, 
without a warning word, bound to a life of troubles — to a 
condition, 

'' Tlie bloom or blight of all men's happiness." 

As the passion of love is probably the greatest enigma 
in the world, so are the actions of men in reference to it the 
most unexplainable. 



Curious fool be still : 



Is human love the grrowth of human will?" 



3-^ 



58 NEW-YORK aristocracy; or. 



CHAPTEE YI. 

Obsequio grassaie: mone, si increbuit aura, 
Cautus uti velet carum caput : extrahe turba, 
Oppositis humeris : aurem substiinge loquaol. 

\_Hor. Sat., lib. 2, 5th. 

Stultus quando videt quod pulchra puellula ridet. 
Turn fatuous credit ae quod amare velit. 

lOvid. 

Our last chapter closed upon poor Simon Musky, 
amid the machinations of female Philistines. We were en- 
deavoring to show hovf small a chance his simplicity would 
stand when brouglit to cope with the polished sophistry of 
the Brindles, and that generalissimo Milly at the head. How 
could the verdant Mars long hold out against the stratagems 
of this wily Venus. Is it worth while to follow the wan- 
derings of this bleating innocent, till we behold him at the 
sacrificial altar ? Shall we relate how the serpent's glitter 
brought its victim within the fatal coil ? But should we 
strive to do these, 'twould be labor half performed. For 
with all our own and the experience of others, with what 
may be learned from the pages of necromancy, yet cannot 
we penetrate within that innermost sanctuary of the wo- 
man's heart. In some little chamber there, she keeps her 
arsenal of love. Are there those who have seen the wea- 
pons of that armoiy exhausted ? Perhaps it might not be 
uninteresting to let my readers know how Simon was first 




^CjBoy^L^ 



Mr. ( 'ringy, while ;it Newport, finds an occasion for pressing his suit with tin; 
" faded daughter." 



GEMS OF JAP0NICA-D05L 59 

lassoed ; how from being a free vagrant bachelor, he was 
tethered with an unseen leash. It having been decided 
among the Brindles that Mr. Musky was an eligible gen- 
tleman, by reason of large hereditaments in muskrat 
and beaver skin, and it being moreover notorious that 
he, from peculiar timidity of temperament, was a person 
that must receive, not make an offer, it was thought ex- 
pedient to patiently await the arrival of the bathing season 
at Newport, at which place Mr. Cringy reported that the 
*'fur man would make his appearance." Let me point you 
out Mr. Cringy. Unless you particularly desire it, I'd rather 
not oblige you, by personal introduction, to shake a hand 
that has done some dirty work in its day. 

There he goes, w^ith his hat on one side, and a cigar in 
his mouth as bad as himself. You can see he is hired ; it 
sticks out all over him : glitters in his buttons ; jingles in 
his hreloque, and impregnates the air about him as strongly 
as the abominable perfumes Avith which he strives to drown 
his own miasma. — How useful ho makes himself ; how he 
plays hypocrite at the clubs ; how he slavered poor Simon, 
who became much astonished and affected at the sudden 
interest he had created ; how he found out whether he 
should carry his tiger and team ; how he discovers his vul- 
nerable spots ; and how dexterously he pays out the line. 
"Who blames him ? he's paid for it ; — such things have 
been and must be done, an 1 why not he as well as another ? 
Besides, some of the Brindle ladies are rather "pass^," and 
still on the carpet, and the reward of faded, though well gilt 



60 NEW-YOEK AEISTOCPwACY ; OR, 

charms, has been a tempting bait to be the faithful dog. 
You see, reader, -where Cringy stands, and how important 
a catspaw his hand will be, in extracting the hot chestnuts 
from Musky's oven. Give me your arm, we will take a 
short turn on the piazza at the Ocean House. 

The Brindles and their bao^Qjap-e have arrived ; I think 
we shall spy them cliqueing in some corner. Ah I there 
they are in studied attitudes, opposite that everlasting 
Fustian, who is still at work with her fan, and her head 
flopping as of old under an immense bunch of feathers. 
How cool and collected on yonder divan reclines Mrs. La- 
vender, as with a " Dudu" languish of her dark eye, and 
lavish display of ivory, she entertains five devoted admirers, 
each of whom is secretly convinced that he is the person 
who really occupies that lady's heart. But though Mrs. 
Lavender seems never a bit to notice the ladies, she is rev- 
eUing in the consciousness of the venom with which old 
Fustian and the Brindles regard her. But of Mrs. L. anon. 
Don't you think Milly has something in view ? She looks 
unusually sharp, and has a great deal of blood up in her 
face. Can it be possible that she is laying her toils for the 
verdant Simon? she evidently expects somebody. You 
can always tell when something great is to be done by the 
extra yards of Valenciennes that adorn her person. Look 
at the whole " ensemble" of the woman, you who pride 
yourself on toilets. Did you ever see any thing like it — the 
faultless contour of the bust (strange that she should hide 
so much beauty in a high neck dress), the exquisite assort- 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 61 

ment of colors, the snowiness of the hnen, the scientific 
balance of the skirts, the beautiful gauging at the waist, the 
skilful manner in which a naturally very red arm has been 
blanched with diamond paste ? By her selection of jewelry, 
which she wears in profusion, you may perceive that she 
has the good taste to keep her diamonds for gas light. I 
like to look at such a subject of condensed art ; it is in- 
structive in its way, showing the proficiency which may be 
attained in personal adornment. When Milly retires for \ 
the night, she will, although it is in the depth of summer, 
hang a very handsome figure over the chair. Young man, 
you who suffer so much from the maddening symmetry of 
the figures that glide by you, producing a thrill, when you 
hear of cotton in Wall-street, think of it also in Waverly 
Place. When I mention Waverly Place, I do not mean to i 
intimate that the great staple of America is confined to ■ 
that fashionable quarter, any more than to Fifth Avenue or t 
Union Square. 

If the truth were known, I have no doubt but that a 
handsome speculation might be made in purchasing by the 
gross, seven-tenths of the grand wardrobes in the city. If 
we could but bribe the milliners out of professional secrecy, 
how many of the plump forms that have plagued us, would | _^ 
become temptationless, and the score of ball-room and f^" 
street Venuses which so long have troubled our dreams and 
our nerves, be reduced to a state of an^ular^innocence ? 
Let me suggest to Dr. Magpie, that he might employ his 
talents to some purpose in getting up a work entitled 



62 NEW-YOEK AEISTOCEACY ; OK, 

'' Confessions of the New- York Milliners," with illustrations 
from life. A thing of this kind would suit the Doctor's 
talents, and, as for the book selling, I'll engage to obtain 
subscriptions at the clubs alone enough to meet first cost. 
As assistant editor, I might respectfully nominate " Billy 
Bop," a kind of social evergreen, whose usefulness and 
harmless antics have served to amuse him and purchase the 
toleration of society for a period that quite antedates the 
recollection of the " oldest inhabitant" — " Mais revenons a 
nos moutons.''^ As you may see, although Milly still keeps 
her corner and is amazingly prinked up, yet she is evidently 
expectant of the arrival of big game, for she is prepared 
with more than ordinary care. She can afford to wait, but 
it is not for long. Her eye lights up as she perceives 
Cringy making his w^ay very leisurely along the promenade. 
Cringy has hooked his trout — on his arm leans the unsus- 
pecting Simon, as modest as a turtle ; his head every now 
and then retreating in its shell, in alarm at the strange sights 
that crowd- upon him. It is not often that one can see a 
more uncomfortable looking individual than he is. 

It is a strange land, and strange beings he has got 
amongst : to him every thing is new — atmosphere, talk, man- 
ners, people and all. There is no question but that — with 
all his new clothes, bright boots, and fearfully starched shirt 
collars, that are sawing off slowly a pair of red-hot ears — he 
is a most unhappy young man, requiring all the address 
and badinage of Cringy to keep him from bolting out dead, 
and forswearing the world forever. Oh ! the horrors of that 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 63 

first gauntlet ! an Indian ambush is nothing to it. After 
passing and repassing once or twice, Cringy, who has re- 
ceived a telegraph, begs that Simon will excuse him but for 
one moment ; and in a moment returns. 

In the course of the evening, when the young men have 
retired to the bar-room, to blend the pleasures of the day 
with the soothing influences of a cigar and '' night-cap," 
Simon is confidentially informed that his appearance has 
produced considerable sensation in a certain quarter ; that a 
certain young lady had pronounced him hlen distingue, with 
other flattering remarks, which if Simon hadn't — like a 
great many others — been an egregrious young fool, who al- 
lowed himself to be deceived by his imagination instead of 
believing his glass, he would have known were nothing more 
than polite lies. In addition to this grateful news. Clingy 
proposes an introduction, adding a few remarks that almost 
take away the breath of our modest tyro, who, between 
fear and anticipatory ecstacy, gasps out a half reluctant 
assent. 

You needn't smile so grandly, my worldhng. Tliere 
was a time when the vision of an ankle or the rustle of a silk 
frock put up your pulse to a beat of twenty faster in the 
minute. We have all had our day in this respect. Had 
Simon known at that time what an easy thing it was for a 
man of his credit, as possessor of unknown wealth in musk- 
rat and raccoon skins, very probably, instead of lying awake 
at night thinking about what he was going to do, when the 
time came, he would have crossed his legs and cautiously 



64 NEW-YOEK ARISTOCEACY ; OE, 

waited the attack. Oh ! the verdancy of youth ! Simon 
thinks of his Avith a twinge hke that of the gout. 

At a proper time Musky is formally introduced to the 
Brindles, and under the seductive tutelage of Milly, he is 
made to feel quite comfortable. Of course Milly knows his 
weak point when she speaks of his horses — says they are 
such dear, sweet creatures, and look so very gentle that she 
really thinks she might drive them ; wouldn't Mr. Musky 
let her drive them as far as the beach, just to see ? And 
isn't he delighted to beg of the young lady to regard them 
as her own, as long as they shall be under the same roof ? 
Milly doesn't approve of driving out with young gentlemen, 
as a general thing ; but then this is different — everybody 
knows Mr. M. — he is such a gentleman, there can be no 
harm in being seen with liirn ! 

How many modes, dear ladies, are there to flatter, in- 
dependently of verbal compliment ? Cringy being duly 
instructed takes occasion, after feeling if he has a good firm 
bite at the hook, to pull on his line very decidedly. He 
tells Simon with great solemnity that his attentions have be- 
come a subject of general remark, and that the young lady's 
family are, of course, aware of his intentions ! (may Cringy 
be forgiven for the lie,) and that, as a gentleman, his ad- 
dresses, in seriatim, at an early period will be expected, and 
(so far as he can judge of the manner in which Mr. M. has 
been entertained by the young lady and her family) not im- 
probably favorably received. If Cringy hadn't been a 
bronzed diplomatist, and one never to be surprised, the ap« 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 65 

pearance of poor Simon, after the intelligence thus commu- 
nicated, would have been somewhat alarming. Intentions ? 
what intentions had he, save to give himself up to the ab- 
sorbing ravishment of his senses' first lesson — to indulge in 
delicious reveries now first opened to his nature. What 
thoughts had he of matrimony in connection with the sub- 
ject, that but for a few days had engrossed his being, in 
fact, the discovery of a new sense. It was no more love, 
than is cold water the power that wings the locomotive 
with lightning. '''Twas passing strange," a dreamy be- 
wilderment, and that was all he knew about it. Cringy, 
however, informs him that this is love, and as in our ignor- 
ance we accept svich interpretations of hieroglyphics as we 
can get, so he must perforce believe this elucidation of what 
was most vague and dim. He was entirely innocent of any 
disposition to marry this piece of art — it had never entered 
his head to many anybody — but then he stood committed 
(and his dear friend's judgment on such matters was infal- 
lible) in this affair ; he must do as he supposed others had 
done. The perceptions of his nature sufficiently indicated, 
that amongst humanity there was a tendency to the love of 
woman, and that is about the amount of all the philosophy 
he possessed, when he concluded to submit to a condition, 
which, above all others, to be tolerable, should be entered 
UTpononly with an entire and clear understanding of its char- 
acter and obligations. If you could get Simon to speak on 
so sore a subject, now that he is a married man, he would 
tell you that so far as his experience goes, there is nothing 



66 NEW-YOKK Aristocracy; or, 

like matrimony to bring one to the realities of life — that his 
•wife, though a reality, and a painful one too — is morally 
and physically no more like the " made dish" that tempted 
his virgin appetite at Newport, that fatal summer, than is 
his appreciation 7iow as it was then. 

Simon's mind has been enlightened upon more subjects 
than that of marriage ; more than once has he been called 
to a knowledge of certain prior predilections of bis wife, and 
of a kind not calculated to add to his felicity. His only 
consolation (it strikes me as rather a poor one) is in the 
fact, that there are hundreds of others in the same bout. 
His wounded spirit, more than ever, finds an asylum from 
mortifying reflections in the congenial atmosphere of his 
stable ; and on occasions of more than ordinary bitterness, 
he obtains substantial relief in the trotters that whisk him 
over the Bloomingdaie inside of three minutes. Simon 
wishes from the bottom of his heart that his ancestors had 
never made a good thing in muskrat. Mrs. M. is as happy 
as a toweringly ambitious woman can be. She hates Mrs. 
Lavender more cordially than ever,- because Mrs. Lavender 
lives on Union Square, and has those attractions (which she 
has not) that bring around her the butterfly beaux. She 
has her box at the Opera, her carriage and servants ; but 
Mrs. Lavender has them too. She has tact, some clever- 
ness, and more bitterness, and artificial looks ; but Mrs. L, 
is really a natural beauty, while in manner, conversational 
talent, and burning satire, she eclipses her altogether. AVhy 
Mrs. Musky should entertain such venom for this represen- 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 67 

tative of "par" value, is a little strange, to say the least. 
As to their extraction, one is just about as good as the 
other — both plain, but respectable (the latter adjective, I 
will observe in passing, is a word which, with nine-tenths 
of the world, is applied to all people but actual convicts), or 
sufficiently so, to have made a little kindred sympathy look 
much more proper than the starched fooleries with which 
they now meet each other. 

As to the amount of pity that ought to be expended by 
the world when viewing this alliance of skim milk and musk- 
rat, I think the balance should be in favor of the masculine 
gender — though they are both necessarily miserable. As 
for Simon, he was *' more sinned against than sinning," the 
unhappy dupe of his own verdancy, and the contemptible 
artifices with which Cringy and the elder members of the 
lady's family ensnared him ; while Milly's conduct, though 
somewhat palliated by our knowledge of the heartless hy- 
pocrisy to which she was educated by those whose influ- 
ences, to a great extent, formed her, and who are the ones 
really most to be censured, yet, for lending herself to so 
selfish a perversion of her womanly nature and instincts, we 
refuse to extend, as we otherwise mio-ht, commiseration for 
the unhappiness brought upon herself, by early blasting the 
blossoms of perhaps the only fruits that would not have 
*' turned to ashes in the mouth." Our own parting advice 
to the Mullicows is, that they shall not entirely repudiate 
the respectable sources by which they inherit the means 
that has elevated them. While monoblasts they may be- 



68 NEW-YOEK AKISTOCEACY ; OE, 

come oblivious to the doleful shriek which announces the 
daily supply, or by extravagance in the aromas of " Lubin," 
overwhelm the fragrance of '^ muskrat ;" but a day of ad- 
versity may come, in view of Avhich, they should make 
timely propitiations to the gods that befriended their ances- 
tors. As for Cringy, the " faithful dog," virtue has met 
its reward, and he has got the faded daughter. " You can't 
get blood from a turnip ;" ergo, it is not surprising that 
Cringy 's vulgarity is hopeless from its unmitigated charac- 
ter, and the respected reader may still see him unchanged, 
except in a more alarming display of brass buttons, or dis- 
pensing a stronger odor of bad cigars. 




Crook and Kensit onoounterinj;' Miss McTab, gallanted In- Dv. Magpie; the jcalousy 
of the former is aroused. 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 73 



CHAPTER YU. 

" Parturiunt moiites, nascetur lidiculus mus." 

Horace— ^rt of Poetry. Line 139. 
" E'en thus, one marks thee shift thy sex and shape, 
All things by turns, but every turn an arc." 

The Vision of Rubeta— Canto Ath—line 864. 

If the reader will brush up his memory, he may possi- 
bly recollect in one of the foregoing chapters, an allusion to 
a certain gentleman, rejoicing under the title of Galey 
Crook, who was supposed to be a species of human ever- 
green. As this individual is famous in his way, and decid- 
edly familiar to every body, and as he moreover represents 
one of the blank pages in the book of New York society, it 
may not be altogether amiss to give his (I was about to say 
character, but my conscience smote me) outlines somewhat 
*' in extensio." The fidelity of the cut, with which the title, 
page is ornamented, is sufficiently graphic and refreshing to 
render unnecessary a more minute account of his personal 
attractions ; though it is a little likely that a description of 
his talk, manner and mode of life, may suggest a point or two 
in his picture, that will be of assistance, at any rate, to those 
who are strangers to the original. It is seldom that we are 
crossed in our path by those who have no apparent object 
in existence ; many undoubtedly spend their time in pursuits 
4 



74: NEW-YOllK ARISTOCRACY ; OR, 

condemned by the world, and as the world, for some cause 
yet unexplained, is allowed to assume a prescriptive jurisdic- 
tion over the business of individuals, we are obliged, incon- 
venient and disagreeable as it may be, to yield to its decis- 
ions a certain portion of respect. Now and then we may 
witness, with a smile of pity or contempt, the useless strug- 
gles of the visionist, or self-appointed genius, or perhaps 
weep at the spectacle of misdirected energies, and yet con- 
ceive the whole to be the result of circumstances ; but the 
\ picture of a human being, acting as it were, without a mo- 
itive, living without an object, and dying almost without a 
Teflection, is something so irreconcilable with all established 
notions, that we pause before it, involuntarily, as an anoma- 
ly of the first water. To such a class belongs the subject 
of our present remarks, and if there are any who may have a 
curiosity to examine a singular specimen of the " genus ho- 
mo," and will forward their address, I will endeavor to put 
them in the way of being gratified. There will be little 
difficulty in recognizing your man, for he is " one in a 
thousand," among ten thousand. Always the same, whether 
in Broadway, at Church, or the Opera, to be once seen is 
to make himself never-to-be-forgotten. Walking or talking, 
dancing or singing, eating or drinking, sleeping or waking, 
before breakfast or after tea, at midday or midnight, * Jocko" 
sticks out everywhere, and is quite as evident as if seen with 
collar and chain, behind the bars of a portable cage in an 
itinerant menagerie. " The same to-day, yesterday, and for- 
ever," he sympolizes as much as a monkey can the attri- 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. iD 

butes of the greatest of all things. With no ostensible 
means of livelihood, he flourishes like a "green bay tree," 
and that remorseless bore, old father Time, passes him with 
scarcely a nod of recognition. He was never known to be 
either young or old, or anything else that I know of. Thus 
far physiologists have striven in vain to assign him a classifi- 
cation ; there is no data to go by, and his longevity is as 
much of a problem as that of the illustrious Joyce Heth's, 
and his condition more of a puzzle than that duplicate myste- 
ry presented by the Siamese Twins. Professor Agassiz has 
arrived very opportunely, and it is expected that he will 
be shortly solicited to lecture at the Tabernacle on the gen- 
eral geological phenomena of this human fossil. All per- 
sons who think of attending, are requested to fit themselves 
by a preparatory course of study. A careful perusal of 
the ** Vestiges of Creation," would make a good commence- 
ment ; while, as a finisher, we would earnestly recommend a 
pious and profound speculation upon the probable analogy 
existing between the toad that is ousted by the powder-blast 
from a snooze of a thousand centuries in his granite bed, 
and the frog that is sojourning temporarily in the human 
thorax. Immediately after this lecture. Dandy Cox has 
volunteered to mount a rum-barrel on the Five Points, and 
edify the assembled multitude with essays from " Barker's 
Journal," in which the relative dignity of doggrel and dirty 
faces, of drama and divinity, will be satisfactorily explained . 
Au the conclusion of the recitation, the literary critic of that 
paper will carry round a hat in one hand and :i subscription list 



76 NEW-YOr.K ARISTOCRACY ; OK, 

in the other, when it is to be hoped that charitable people 
will put a penny in the one and their name on the other. 
Three barrels especially reserved for Horace Greeley, Wen- 
dall Phillips, and Lloyd Garrison. Abolitionists, generally, 
bringing with them wenches weighing over two hundred, 
will be allowed one hogshead each, with exclusive use of 
the bung hole thereof. No postponement on account of 
w^eather. In case of great heat, no bad consequences need 
be apprehended from the development of certain proper- 
ties natural to a motley multitude, as the committee of 
" ways and means" will provide such disinfectants as the 
occasion may require. 

The moral and physical organization of Mr. Galey is a 
wonderfully happy one. He is probably as happy a per- 
son as resides within the city limits. The " pursuit of hap, 
piness," which it is said most men are addicted to, is some- 
thing our friend never engages in, for happiness seems to go 
in pursuit of him ; and what is more, finds him and abides 
by him, with very few exceptions, on all occasions. He is 
so delighted with everything about his path of life that one 
might suppose the world to have had no other occupation for 
the last thirty years, but to contrive means to minister to 
his individual happiness. As long as there is a shilling in 
his pocket, soap for a shave, and a shirt for his back, the am- 
bition of this true philosopher is satisfied. Diogenes with 
his tub, thought he was doing things with very commenda- 
ble humiUty, but he w^as all w^rong, if the proverb be right 
that " every tub should stand on its own bottom." The 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. il 

fountains of Galey's pleasure are unfailing in their sup- 
ply and freshness, and the muddy currents, AYhich rise in 
most every one's river of life, never darken the waters of 
his. A bright dnj, a cheap dinner, or an expression of a 
lady which every one save himself understands as irony 
of the plainest kind, will give him an ecstacy and pride felt 
only by the youthful biddy, when cackling with maternal 
tenderness over her first incubation. Probably there has 
not been a large entertainment for the last half century 
that he has not attended, and in the greater number been 
bottle washer of some sort, and yethisinvitations are received 
with the same unblase pleasure, and answered with as much 
alacrity as they would be by the catechumen of sixteen. 
The truth is, that the benevolent Provivlence which is svp- 
^-tosed to number the hairs (I wonder if the grey ones are 
included) of our heads, taking pity on such total intellectual 
vacuity, has generally substituted an exquisite organic sus- 
ceptibihty, whereby this modern Socrates, 

" by Nature's kindly law, 

Pleased with a rattle, tickled with a straw," 

may transcribe light pleasures, that float upon the breeze, 
as the polished plate of a daguerreotype arrests upon its vital 
surface the smallest passing atom. One would naturally think 
that a person who had, season after season, encountered the 
vicissitudes of our winter campaign, and kept pace with its 
abominably late hours, would show the usual signs of such 
hard service ; but our hero is invulnerable as Achilles, and 



^8 NEYv'-YOEK AEISTOCEACY ; OR, 

like that dlsting-uisbed gentleman, must have been early 
dipped in some preservative pickle, that has ren^lered him 
proof n gainst the combined influences of lobster suppers and 
heated rooms. I question very much -whether he ever suf- 
fered from the nightmare, even after tlie fearful havoc he 
generally makes amongst pate de foie gras and boned turkey. 
He will wind up his repast by drinking a bumper of every 
.. liquor he can lay his hand on, stop at the hotel on his way 
\ home, and drink brandy and water, and smoke strong cigars, 
I ad infinitum, and come out from his straw next morning with 
fa clear eye and a face as radiant with health as if he had 
taken a stretch of twelve hours on spring-water and Boston 
crackers. In fact, if you were in tropical climates, you 
wouldn't be at all surprised in early morning walks to see him 
in half a dozen different trees, jumping from limb to limb, 
with a cocoanut in his claw. He ought to be kept on pur- 
pose for dyspeptic people to look at. An ostiich would 
envy him as much as he would emulate an oyster. 

As may be inip.gined, the instinct ihsit guides so curious a 
machine, must be a very funny thing indeed. A stranger 
meeting him in Broadway, and seeing him tacking in his 
slippery way through the crowd, and going through the 
contortions of a half flayed eel, would not probably be greatly 
surprised to see him dart out with a hop, skip, and jump, 
and climb a liberty pole. For the same reason, when he 
makes his appearance in a room (especially if tliere be ladies 
present), it is a mutter of extreme uncertainty whether he 
will make a dive at the coal scuttle, or leap on top of the 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 79 

piano. When he has taken his seit, his operations become 
still more curious and exciting, opening- and shutting, like a 
big jack-knife, till his nose is fairly flattened against the front 
rounds of his chair between his legs, and you are expecting 
to hear him close completely with a tremendous snap. You 
would hardly think such a creature as this capable of falling 
in love : such is the case, nevertheless; and, what is still 
better, he thinks there are those who are suffering in the 
same way for him. He is quite as indispensable as Brown, 
at parties, and, as the office of manager of a modern ball 
requires about the same amount of genius as it does to be a 
'* dumb loaiterj^ Mr. Crook is, of course, in constant demand 
with ladies of all ages. Happily for him, he likes it just 
as well with one as the other, and, from the enthusiasm ma- 
nifested on such occasions, he can be supposed to be engaged 
in nothing of less parallel importance than that of consum- 
mating the treaty at Ghent, or, at any rate, of settling the 
compromise question. Somehow or other, as regards the 
ladies, he manages to get just so far, and no farther. It is 
very well understood amongst them, that, excepting the 
unaccountableness with which strangers must regard such an 
association, no serious gossiping can be manufactured from 
their intimacy with one whose peculiar harmlessness is so 
generally known and acknowledged, that they are as little 
likely to lose caste as they would be if constantly seen with 
their grandmothers. In truth, we might speculate much 
wider of the truth, than by supposing him destined to fill 
just the sphere he does. In pretty much all places, I believe, 



80 NEW-YOKK AKISTOCEACY ; OE, 

there may be found one or more fixtures of this character, 
that would be missed, much in the manner that a lamp 
would, if taken away from a corner of the street. In case 
of a conflagration, if the alarm bell was not soundt^d, people 
I would be astonished, and so they would, perhaps, and 

; somewhat in the same way, if Mr. Crook should absent him- 
self from the soiree, without tendering a valid excuse. I 
suppose there are fifty kdies, at the very least, within the 
confines of our city proper, whom he sincerely believes to 
be dragging out a wretched existence on his account — vic- 
tims of an unrequited love ! ! Think of tliat, ladies, and 
remember that you, too, any of you, may figure as subjects 
in this unhappy category. How acutely, particularly will 

Miss ^' * ^ -^ ^ *^ of 13 street, feel the force of these 

remarks, and how despairingly will her anguish be renewed. 

There was Miss McTab, of Place, who was either 

made unhappy by him, or made him unhappy ; it is not 
quite certain which it was. Tliis lady is a blonde spinster, 
with charms to make anybody's heart quake ; and on 
whose account my poor evergreen got himself into a very 
bad way. This was among the very few instances in which 
it threatened to be a serious affair. Asa general thing, it 
is sufficient for a lady to give a gentle smirk, to produce the 
desired effect. He has never been able to keep himself 

' from mistaking the afiectionate cordiality adopted in the 
manner of a lady about to ask a favor, for indications of an 
entirely different character ; and it is quite enough for a lady 
to avail herself of his umbrella on a rainy Sunday, to keep 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 81 

him squirming and swelling for a week, like a frog that finds 
himself smuggled from tl;e cold spring to the seething 
cauldron. This very gentleman, whom you could almost 
touch off at any minute of the day, with the cigar, behind 
which he looks so happy, will try to make you believe that 
he is very unexcitable — a callous " individual" — a pattern 
of phlegm and immobihty ; and yet, it is credibly asserted; 
that, on certain occasions, under the excitement of the mo- 
ment, he has gone down, before a parlor full, on his marrow 
bones. 

With all the negative qualities, thus far evoked from the 
chaiacter of Mr. Crook, we have mingled more of pity than 
contempt ; but the rigid truth constrains us to confess that 
from one point of view, he looks confounded bad. I allude 
to him in the character of a rival — v/hen he conceives any 
one to be standing in his hght, with respect to his lady love, 
pro tem. On such occasions, (;ilas ! for poor human na- 
ture,) he shows himself "more of a knave than a fool," 
thereby reversing the picture he usually presents. Under 
the circumstances he feels permitted to volunteer, unsolicit- 
ed, a narrative of all he can pick up and invent relating to 
the gentleman's habits, connections, means, &c., or at any 
rate, such of them as he thinks will be the means of effec- 
tually disparaging his character ; and, to make the thing 
sure, (that I should be obliged to say it,) eke it out with 
falsehood. They say he came very near spoiling Mr. 

's chance with the Rumkees, and that he also like to 

have been substituted by Mr. Pindlekins for the Sphinx's 
4* 



82 

Head. There v/as Mr. Linkinpop, of the Charter Oak, or 
Connecticut aristocracy, notorious for Wis extreme modesty 
and reserve, Avho being a sufferer siinilarljr with Miss Eed- 

lura, of Park, was on the point of breaking out wilh 

a horse- whip, had not Charley Menshun (v.dio is a bit of a 
wag, and a wit,) diverted his ''wiath and cabbage," by say- 
ing that such nn act would render him liable, under tlie 
statute of " cruelty to animals." There are many other 
points in the character of this strange combination, I should 
f^"^ ' wish that mv readers might see and study — many which I 
think would serve to illustrate still more strongly his failings 
and follies ; but enough, I think, has been related to show 
that a man may live on and deceive himself all his life, and 
yet think that h.e is living to some purpose withal, if people 
at times should smile, between sorrow and destitution, at 
one who, 

like an anqrry ape, 






Plays such fautiistic t)-icks beioie high heaven, 
As makes the angels weep." 

I shall not intrude, upon the conclusion of this subject, 
any very lengthy description of the family tree of Galey 
Crook. Suffice it that he is what I call second in hand lou\ 
or, in other words, a remove of only one or two generations 
from a respectable old gentleman bearing his name, who 
was to be seen of the fine afternoons in summer in a retired 
country village, mending breeches, with great industry and 
shov/ of genius. The poets and philosophers will now and 
then say a true thing. Young, in that very clieerful pro- 
duction entitled «'Niirht Thoughts," has recorded an opinion 



GEMS OF JAl'ONICA-DOM. 83 

that must be very consoling to the majority of mankind ; it 
reads as follows : 

" Men may live fools, but foois they cannot die." 

As an appropriate companion of this very useful member 
of society, from whose further description the limits of these 
pages will oblige me to desist, I beg leave respectfully to 
introduce for public inspection, a choice specimen of an 
animal of the same genus, and whom slight mention hns 
been made of under the name of Billy Rensit. For giving 
two doses in succession, I expect no thanks ; on the con- 
trary, am willing to suffer a little abuse. When, however, 
an unpleasant thing is to be done, it is the wisest plan to do 
it at once, and get through as soon as may be, (a valuable 
suggestion, which it is probable most of my readers think it 
had been better if I had acted on in this very work) there- 
fore, in discussing the merits of this remaining unit of the 
" Duo Foscari," I shall strive that brevity may be the soul 
of wit. A lovely twain they make, as may be seen by the 
cut that accompanies this chapter — "par nobile fratrum," 
a hberal rendering of which, under its present application, 
would be — a pair of Billy-Goais. The illustrious Rensit 
is a sweet savored scion of the sugar baking aristocracy on 
the one side, while from the maternal tree he inherits the 
honors that belonged to a retail vender of thread and 
needles. It is immaterial as to whether his wealth (without 
which he would have been, as he ought now to be — a name- 
less ninkompoop,) was the derivative of sugar-cane, or of 



84 

small profits in tape and needles — nor does it matter why or 
how so slimy a reptile has been allowed to warm his grovel- 
hng instincts in the sun of decent patronage — nor yet that 
people are found, so lost to all sense of self-respect, as to 
bring their offerings to the Golden Calf — but it is astonish- 
ing, and as an indication of the pitch to which society has 
got in certain matters, worthy of note, that an abortion of 
bullion with more brass than brains, and more malice and 
mendicity than manhood, should pass till now ** imwhipt of 
justice." Is there such a premium on vice that there are 
none bold enough to lash its votaries " naked through the 
world ?" Or has virtue and meek poverty lost heart en- 
tirely, and become afraid in the shadow cast upon them by 
the dazzling gceptre of mammon ? Alas, I cannot tell, and 
for the matter of that, w^ho can ? I am no declaimer 
against wealth or the delightfulness of its possession, or 
indeed of its efficacy in any way ; indeed I respect a man 
for his money if he has got plenty of it, for he must have 
had head and perseverance to have acquired it ; even must 
I own, (bettor tell the truth and shame the devil,) to having 
indulged occasionally in a little undue reverence for the 
'' mon 'o siller," and I can easily imagine how weak human 
nature may, to a certain extent, be overcome by its potent 
influences ; but when I see a man under its baleful im- 
pulses, sell his independence, his self-i-espect, his honor, or 
that of his family, I regard it in a different light. My own 
experience teaches me sufficiently on these points. I have 
drank deep and long of the cup of poverty, long enough to 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 85 

know how nice it is to be rich ; but, thank God, it never has 
driven me to ihe wish of compromising one single feeling of 
independence, or abated one jot or tittle of my respect for 
the innate dignity of human excellence. Still there is no 
lever that has the power of wealth, and few things that 
biing greater blessings. There is one ambition that will 
always be rife amongst us, which is to 

" Get place and wealth, if possible, with grace, 
If not, by any means get wealth and place." 

There may be, however, a degree to which the impor- 
tance of riches, as the only means of happiness, may be ad- 
vocated, that can be substantiated neither by reason nor 
experience. There are some who, carrying, as they do 
everything else, the idea of filthy lucre to the yo^rgQ of ab- 
surdity, are reminded in the plenitude of their infallibility, 
that there are conditions of life where 

" Much wealth brings want, that hunger of the heart 
Which comes when nature man deserts for art.''^ 

These ideas have betrayed me into a digression, the 
prosiness and length of which must be apologised for, more 
particularly as, in doing so, the subject which suggested 
them has been ** thrown overboard," and left to the dogs. 
Mr. Rensit is a true *' dog in the manger"; finding that, 
with all his wealth (the daily accumulation of which his 
well-known avarice makes easy of belief), and all his inco- 
herent babblings of treasures laid up and invested, an un- 
mistakeable opinion of him is formed, do what he may to 
alter it, he takes vengeance upon the Fates for making him 



S6 NEW-YOKK ARISTOCRACY ; OR, 

a dirty cur, by venting Lis lieing calumnies upon every one, 
indiscriminately, who frequent, by night, those social circles 
in which they and their fcithers have been born, but into 
which he has crawled, and, from an imaginary elevation, 

" Hangs hissing at the nobler mn.n below !" 

Rensit is a great boy — a regular c ise — ^^and only lacks 
; brains to be a snob of the first water. As it is, he is such 
I a miserable balderdash, such a weak compost of bad quali- 
J ties, that he wants that kind of dignity which even bad men 
' not unfrequently possess, that would allow us to accuse him 
of possessing traits of character. Tiiere is one affection, 
however, in which he is as completely swallowed up as he 
is in the contemptible opinion of those who know what he is, 
and that is an avarice of the most intense description. For 
one of his years, I doubt whether one can be found any- 
where to compete with him in miserly inclinations. His 
is the real love of money, not for what it will bring, bu^ 
for the money s sake. From his earliest years did he mani- 
fest this grasping spirit of gain — this love of accumulation 
— this passion for hoarding up, and raking and scraping, 
and putting away. I have heard it related of him, that, like 
the old misers represented in pictures, he was in the habit of 
secretly visiting his money bags, to count and re-count their 
glittering contents. In my ** mind's eye," I can see him 
gloating over his hidden treasure, calculating, with a dull 
brain, how, by mean shifts, and underhanded parsimony, he 
can add to its amount. What do you think of a person 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. hi 

who, to save, will wear a pinchbeck silver, and la}^ away, 
for special occasions only, his gold watch ! Doesn't such 
an act speak what a man is, in language not to be mis- 
taken ? When Billy sends a bouquet to a Lady (which he i 
never does unless he has serious designs), he takes very \ 
good care that no one else gets the credit of it ; and if the 
recipient should mei.tion, in his presence, her suspicions as 
to the donor, she is sure to be set right, in a trice, in case of 
a mistake. All this (if a man has only got the face to go \ 
it) is perfectly honest ; but Mr. R. goes even so far as to j 
take advantage, in case of a lady's being unable to ascertain 1 
to whom she is indebted for a serenade, or a bunch of flow- | 
ers, and get for himself the credit of it all. A man that j 
would do that, wilh an opportunity, would do worse things, i 
An amusing story is related of him (the truth of it may be 
known among his acquaintances), that goes a good ways to 
show that a chicken may crow on his own dunghill, and be 
obliged to sneak after all. During a visit to the springs, 
he was unlucky enough to lose a V on a bet with either the 
clerk or the barkeeper of the hotel where he stayed, but was 
positively too stingy to pay it. On being asked why he 
refused, he replied, "Because his (i. e. the clerk's) family 
was not as good as his." Whereon Mr. Clerk says, " I'll 
go you another five on that ;" which banter, as Mr. Billy 
Rensithad no idea of losing anything more, remained unac- 
cepted. From that day to the present, my "sugar-cane 
green" has been more careful that he makes his wagers in a 
way that will not admit the chance of his losing, as well as 



88 NEW-YOEK aristocracy; or, 

that there shall be no chance of ill-natured ways, offering to 
bet on the antiquity of his family. But enough, and more 
than enough, of this fellow. If he was not a fictitious per- 
sonage, I should wish to wash my (as, no doubt, even as it 
is, my readers wish to their) hands of one whose conduct 
reminds you how truly 

'•A heavy purse. 
In a fool's pocket, is a heavy curse." 




Mrs. Blowliard, ■walking with her frionrls on 5tli Avenue, is iiceosted by a relative, who 
has lately arrived. 



GEMS OF JArONICA-DOM. 89 



CHAPTER YIII. 



-? sani uL creta, an carbone notundi ?" 

Hur. Sat., Liber 2, Sat. III. 



What a capital arrangement ii is that there should exist, 
in almost every thing, a principle of (it might almost be 
said) never ending variety. The idea is suggested at this 
immediate time, more forcibly from the fact of our very re- 
cent communion Avith a couple of worthies, from whom, if 
it were not possible to find an occasional emarxipation, it 
would not be long before the fabled horrors of a revolution 
on Ixion's wheel, Avould not seem such a very bad ^«n2 after 
all. No one need complain of sameness in any of the or- 
ders of our social structure. If ice havn't a diversity of 
materials to select from in the construction of character, I 
don't know what people have. Every shade of oz<r kaleido- 
scope will bring out, in lucid harmony, a bright and alter- 
nating prism of beau.ty that shall typify an epitome of the 
flags of all nations. A stranger visiting our city, cannot 
well help being struck with the tenacious air of exclusive- 
ness, that pervades every clique of every class. He sees 
spread out before him, from the Battery to the Reservoir, a 
mosaic of most pretentious coloring. The new acquaintances 



90 NEW-YOKK aristocracy; or, 

he forms will persecute him in turns, with a most conscien- 
tious determination to proselyte him to their own particular 
set. Of course, to be the subject of so much sohcitude, he 
must neither be an unpretending man nor the possessor of 
unpretending credentials ; he must be well heralded in his 
letters introductory, and bear about him, very decidedly, the 
air of a man who is receiving rather less than more civility, 
than he expected ; he must talk as if he knew a little more 
about everything, than anybody else, for in so doing, more 
than in any other way, he will be pretty sure to get the 
credit of being (what the jSTew Yorkers are particularly crnzy 
to get hold of ) a dis'ingidsked stranger. Should he manage 
to obtain a reputation of this description, there w^ill be no 
lack of jolly tim.es, if he be inclined that way. People ab- 
solutely can't do enough for him ; they will all vie with one 
another in extending civilities, and if he has no apprehen- 
sion of gout or of being suddenly appoplcxed, he will carry 
av/ay with him a remembrance of having drank the most 
highly applauded wine, and having seen the worst speci- 
mens of refinement that one can well, in so short a time. 
But more anon of distinguished strangers — their experiences, 
and experiences of them. We have now to lead our patient 
followers in a new path of pleasure. Emigration is a great 
thing, and, as may be found by statistics on that subject, is in- 
creasing at such a ratio, as will make it entitled to special 
legislation, one of these days. This great and fertile country 
is beginning actually to swarm with new comers, who atone 
gulp of a ship show themselves in nice little batches of five 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 91 

or six hundred. With a meagre allowance, indeed, of bread 
and freedom, at home, the}'" come to us not only to get those 
essentials, but to seek in that ** area of freedom," -which is 
now of world-wide renown, a chance, an egtial chance in the 
pursuits that ambition may instigate. It is wonderful wiih 
what strides, and by what accidents, some of our transat- 
lantic brethren, of the humblest orders, arrive at affluence 
and consideration after having served but a very short time 
of citizenship. Sometimes the friends of these of the 
* lucky sort," arrive on our shores to find their eniondam 
acquaintances changed in their " state cf being," to a de- 
gree little less wonderful than the magical metamorphoses 
that befell the celebrated Cinderella, with her glass slip- 
pers. Trusting, with the unsuspecting credulity of un- 
sophisticated natures, to the strength of an early and long- 
continued intimacy, they approach these favorites of for- 
tune, encouraged to expect a helping hand, from the memo- 
ry of kindnesses performed, when amid the poverty of their 
native land they shared alike the frugal store. Poor fools 1 
how little do they know of the suddenly-grown great. Tiie 
proverb that tells us where beggars *' fetch up" that are 
put on '• horseback," may not occur to ikem, but when, even 
before an appeal is uttered for sympathy or assistance, they 
find their acquaintance disclaimed, and their identity denied 

With that dull-rooted, callous impudence 
Which, dead to shame, and every nicer sense, 

hesitates not to add falsehood to ingratitude, they are taught 
that bitter lesson so few are in happy ignorance of, that 



92 

friendship, when weighed against gold, must "kick the 
beam." I have about as little faith in the beneficial results 
of suddenly-acquired wealth, as in the efficacy of sudden 
conversions. In either case, as in the vegetable world, an 
undue growth must produce rankness. There, Mrs. Blow- 
hard, if you are not satisfied with such a description of the 
goblet, you must be unreasonable, and I cannot expect you 
to be any better pleased at the analysis which I propose to 
make of its contents. It will be recollected, possibly, tiiat 
/ this lady was casually introduced as a branch of the paddy^ 
I or " small potato" patricians, as well as that of her being 
I ingrafted matrimonially on an unknown stock. There are 
complexities in the extract of Mrs. B. which even my 
omniscient orreiy is unable to help me out of. *' Old Irish" 
is, I believe, pretty much obsolete, or else I might possibly 
rake up more in reference to the ramifications of the family 
radix. All I know is, that Miss Kathleen Dennis, (to which 
agreeable cognomen the present Mrs. B. was wont to res- 
pond, 

" While yet a sweet maid in her teens,") 

■was pronounced, unanimously, by the best judge?, as a young 
lady who was (in the expressive vernacular of Yankeedom) 
as ^' Irish as blazes ;^* it is not positively known whether she 
was so on both sides, but the bal mce of evidence was in 
favor of such a supposition. Mrs. B. has all the physical 
peculiarities of her nation, and they are more distinct than 
that of any other. AVas ever an Irishman or woman, ever 
mistaken for anything else than what they were? Amidst 



GEMS OF JAPOKICA-DOM. 93 

a thousand tongues, how clear, and sharp, and unmistakable 
breaks in that rattlina: broo-ue, as tlie shrill clarion and the 
thunders of battle, or as the quick and almost appalling clash 
of cymbals, that clangs out at intervals above the roar of the 
heaviest instrumentation. And then, as if the distinguishing 
characteristics were not enough, the " devil has walked over 
their faces with hot nails in his shoes;" or, in other words, 
three-fiflhs of them are pitted with a disease, an almost 
entire monopoly of which seems, with little justice, to 
have been forced upon them. What have they done to de- 
serve so singular a visitation ? Is it a stigma sent for sub- 
mission to British tyranny or an offset to their freedom 
from snakes ? I leave this curious question in the hands of 
the learned professions. However, careful inoculation has 
saved Mrs. B. from constitutional tendencies in this respect, 
and but for dress and a few other externals she might pass 
almost anywhere for a tolerably nice chamber-maid. Her 
education and accomplishments are in excellent keeping 
with her appearance. Her correspondents are the best wit- 
nesses to these trifling deficiencies. They can attest, if they 
will, her dread despoliations in the ranks of simple orthog- 
raphy, while the murderous onslaughts against king's Eng- 
ish, would be sufficient to convict her before a jury of her 
peers. Bad grammar, luckily, is quite common enough, 
amongst our precocious noblesse, to prevent it, even when 
associated with brogue, from militating very severely any 
young lady's reputation. By v/ay of a little choice piece of 
gossip, dear reader, not very new, nor yet altogether not 



94 NEAV-YORK ARISTOCRAOY ; OE, 

pertinent to the occasion, have you heard Miss Buck- 
breeches remark to a gentleman, after visiting the beautiful 
Diisseldorf collection ? If not, I will tell you that you may 
learn how ''a little knowledge is a dangerous thing." '^She 
thought it must have taken Mr. Diisseldorf a long time to 

have painted so mang pictures /^^ 

Miss Kathleen's papa did not stint his daughter in the ad- 
vantages proper to an aspiring paddy ; on the contrary, he 
was aware of the importance of what is termed a fashiona- 
ble education, (more properly a stay at some notorious 
boarding-school,) and after indenturing her for the prescribed 
period to the enlightened system of Madame Cantdy's es- 
tablishment, he finislied her off with a few months of polish 
at Madame Shagback's, After having thus graduated, in 
the full honors of a distorted disposition and warped un- 
derstanding, she is brought back to the paternal piggery, 
and submiited to Seilor Raspberrie, with whom she will 
learn imitations of the kettle drum, to spoil pianos. Two 
days afterward, comes Sefior Brandigealli, whose business it 
is to bring under control the broken-winded " shrill treble" 
of a voice, (designed by nature only to swell the bacchanal- 
ian choius of a '* wake,") and render it so that it may be 
mistaken either for the expiring twang of cat-gut, broken 
under full tension, or the hungry wail of a wildcat. Course 
No. 3 will find her imder tlie tutelage of Monsieur Crapeau, 
who will do his best to soften the asperity of her untamed 
brogue, into a mild and modiGed paddy p)<-'-iois. As a fin- 
isher, or dessert to this diversified dinner of attainments, 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 95 

Seiior Soreraccii, will instruct her privately in the ternary- 
graces of Polka, Mazourka and Schottische, and at the same 
time impress her with the great superiority of the modern "tet- 
ering" style of ambulation (performed on tiptoe, as if an egg 
were tied on the bottom of each heel) to the undignified strides 
of a short, shambling bog-trot. These, perhaps, will comprise 
what is considered necessary for personal accomplishments. 
Before, however, committing this precious cargo of dry 
goods to the chances of capture by matrimonial pirates who 
infest those seas in which she is to navigate her bright-col- 
ored bark, her respected parents will see fit to administer a 
little wise counsel by way of a centreboard. Her direc- 
tions consist in being told when she must hang out false, and 
when true colors — when to invite an attack, and when to 
spread sail for flight; and when, in case of some rich but 
coy adventurer, she may get ready her grappling irons to 
board herself. And now having followed this young lady 
through the labyrinths of a fashionable initiatory, we may 
be permitted to convoy her, during the remainder of her 
journeying, which will not cease till she reaches (pardon, 
pitying patron, so poor a pun) the '-Isle of MAN." We shall 
now see what uses she will make of her education, and 
Avhether that education will not be found to have inculcat- 
ed primarily, a system of principles in which the sentiments 
of truth and sound morality, have had little share ; that, 
on the contrary, its teachings and tendencies have been to 
the encouragement and support of a creed which recognizes 
expediency, and a most intense worldliness, as preferable to 



96 

uncompromising integrity, and simple sincerity. If her ac- 
counts of "poor relations" be true, she cannot be credited 
with a very flattering opinion of her "kinsfolk;" and it is 
seldom the opportunity is foregone to give them a rap over 
the knuckles, if by so doing she can stave oft' a strong sus- 
picion of the family starting goal. Yet when hard pressed 
or cornered, she can take the opposite tack, and talk of 
uncontrollable fancies for revisiting, beyond the broad, blue 
water, (och, murther, only to think of it!) ancestral walls that 
stand mid ancient parks, till you almost believe that instead 
of living in a shanty, where the pig is partitioned off with a 
pine deal and three-legged stool, she may in truth have 
dwelt where 



" perfumed lights 

Stole through the mists of alabaster lamps '' 

Notwithstanding that mamma took it very hard at first, as soon 
as Miss Kathleen came to weigh her acquaintances, she forth- 
with proceeded to repudiate her Hibernian friends, and the 
consequence is, that her pug nose is turned up with supreme 
contempt at those, even, with v/hom she once thought if 
she could only even associate, it would be the height of 
human ambition. Alas ! for the Flannagans, the Doyles, 
the Doughertys, the Burkes, and the Kelleys, and all the 
rest of them, they are no more to find favor in the eyes of 
old Dennis's daughter. Old ma Dennis stood out like a 
good one (an honest, cook-like looking woman she is, to be 
sure,) against these violations of the first laws of kindness, 
and kindred, and country, and wouM have remained staunch 



GEMS OF JArOXICA-DOM. 97 

in her loyalty to nature had not ihefaiher of Kathleen him- 
self, turned recreant to his patriotism, and silenced the 
scruples of his better half by appealing to her motherly 
feelings. "And isn't it me dawther," he would say, '' whose 
intherests are to be made with the great folks ? and is it the 
girruls own mother as ud stand in her light ? it's yourself as 
should know with ow much deefeculty I have fought me way 
to where I stand." One or two great changes go a great 
way to reconcile people to almost anything, and when Mrs . 
Dennis thinks of the advantages of brown-stone houses 
over bog huts, she lays a "flattering unction" to her soul, 
that is comforting indeed. I have my doubts, whether Mrs. 
Japhet Blowhard is ever annoyed at the present day with ma- 
ternal lectures on ingratitude, false pride, or anything of that 
kind. 

A slight sketch of old Dennis, who' " rules the roMst," 
will give you an insight of the man's character, and make 
the conduct of his household, not so entirely unnatural as 
one might suppose, who has been in the dark "a priori." Tom 
Dennis was originally a sort of head ship carpenter, 
whose knowledge of his trade was not half so powerful in 
brmging him up in the world, as a forward and impudent 
assumption of equality, by which, regardless of his want of 
refinement, education and natural disqualifications for the 
society of gentlemen, after a little good luck and dishon- 
est advantage taken in money transactions, he pushed him- 
self forward with shameless precipitancy upon the compass 
sionats acknowledgment of his superiors. There are way- 
6 



98 NEW-YOSK ARISTOCRACY ; OE, 

enough to the sharp mhided, by which an acquaintance (ren- 
dered through ordinary agencies, perhaps, ahnost impracti- 
cable, by a wide disparity of circumstances,) with very de- 
sirable people may be accomplished, and the trick of it re- 
main undetected. A miserable sot in the gutter, may, under 
certain circumstances, so evoke compassion, that the hand of 
charity will raise him up, and on evidences of proper con- 
trition, assist forward, with much kindness. Taking advan- 
tage of the amiable traits of human nature, a sordidly am- 
bitious spirit \n\\ find a thousand ways to take the blind 
side of unsuspecting goodness, and with a spirit of perse- 
verance worthy a better cause, whine, and fawn, and crawl 
through the ordure of falsehood and deceit, to compass its 
dirty desires. I Avill not take it upon me to say, how Mr. 
D. went to work to cut his niche in the temple of Snobdom, 
but I know there are those, yea, very many, who can recol- 
ect since when the manners and conversation of that per- 
son were characterized by a gentleness and becoming 
humihty, at marked variance with the pretentious demon- 
strations of his present bearing. I really believe, though, 
that assurance has become so much of a second nature with 
him that he is really unconscious of ever having been in a 
different position of life. 

How vividly peers out from the Opera-box his round, red, 
apple face, gleaming with good brandy and bad breeding, as 
he sits in a corner and watches with benignant composure the 
visits of the young bucks, between acts, to his " daivters ;'' 
the objects of the said young bucks, supposed to be a de- 



.. ^ 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 99 

sire to command a view of certain portions of the house, 
obtainable from no other point, as also to revive iJie accent 
that will gain them great eclat, when imparted to their Irish 
anecdote at the next supper party. They say he is a " good 
Catholic," and as a matter of course, holds a pew, either 
in St. Peter's, or the Cathedral, and what is better still, is 
seen to occupy it quite regularl3^ Not being a communi- 
cant in either of those churches, I cannot say which is the 
most fashionable, but if any one will inform me, I will bet 
my " pile" that I tell the one frequented by one Mr. Tom 
Dennis- I suppose Bishop Hughes must dine with him 
some times, (for all our wealthier Catholics are great enter- 
tainers of their clergy,) and it would be amusing to know 
what so great and good a man, and so liberal a divine 
must think of what he hears and sees, when a partaker of 
the bouuties of Tom's good dinners. Of course he must 
go to church in his coach (poor horses of which, what a lot 
is theirs) for thereby the lowly worshippers that bend to the 
shrine in the portals and passages, are made aware, by the 
rattling wheels, which dispel devotion, that a great man is 
nearing, and must be made room for. Dennis is fond of 
the good things of this world, and amongst those for 
which he has a very decided but amiable weakness, may be 
counted tlie generous properties of alcohol, in all its forms. 
Now and then, both at home and at parties to which he 
has been invited, this lighteous and red-nosed old gentle- 
man loill get just tipsy enough to boast, and talk bad 
grammar; the latter he can't help, being natural to liim 



Ltf 



100 

but the former is a virtue, which in sober moments he has 
resolved, and re-resolved, that he would never be guilty of 
being caught at, if he could in any way avoid it ; by the 
time, however, the heavy sherry make its appearance, those 
good resolutions, so often formed, have been hidden under 
his white Marseilles, and drowned, 

" Like Clarense in a butt of Malmsey," 

beyond the hope of recovery Mr. Dennis, as a busi- 
ness man, is known as a first rate Jailer ; his present afflu° 
ence is mainly attributed to this fact. Failing rich is now 
reduced to a science, and carried on to an extent, and with 
an impunity, which would make our old fashioned, honest 
Knickerbocker merchants of the last century, turn over in 
their graves with astonishment, could they hear of it. Be 
sure, if a man practices this way of doing business, and keeps 
rich by building his fortunes on tlie ruins of his neighbors, 
1)6 must crush some irretrievably, and make enemies of 
others ; but then it is a very easy and quick way of making 
a fortune, and can have no objection made against it, unless 
it be tluU a few ijlibeml people, who are behind the age_ 
should say ih^iii]^diyhona>t. What is honesty, now-a 
days, amongst very many merchants, but an obsolete expres- 
sio n; a virtue, the wearing of which pays very poorly? 
Dennis keeps pace witli the age, and coasequenlly he will 
never be poor. Fo)iner]y, if a man failed, he was likely to 
be found dead some fine morning shortly after. Tempora 

MUTANTKH, ET WVTAML^R ILI-IS Well, let him gO' 



GEMS OF JAPOKICA-DOM. 101 

Society, by tolerating such acts from its members, -without 
even the expression of a frown, holds out a premium for ill- 
gotten gain, which there will always be unprincipled men 
enough to take advantage of. I regret that a want of space 
will not allow me further to follow the character and con- 
duct of Mrs. Blowhard. We have only seen a few of the 
fruits of the young tree ; could we watch subsequent trans- 
pUatiogs, we might still behold, in maturer yieldings, the 
character of the first graft. Too true, perhaps, may prove 
the trite old proverb, that 

*'Ju3t as the twig is bent the tree '3 inclined ;" 

and too sorrowfully may we be witnesses of its sad prema- 
turity in " the sere and yellow leaf." " In the nursery was 
the canker-worm of that tree.'* 



■ ■ - n 




l-'ntiik 



ilniw^ Mr>. .To.uu-erV altcntion to the sj-lendia stylo n 
.,m- n .•avatiiia to Miss WailcrV M-'.-oinpainiu 



liirh \:\n Dunk i< 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 103 



CHAPTEK IX. 

" et in seipso totus, teres atque rotundus, 

Externi ne quid valeat per leva morari ; 
In quem raanca ruit semper Fortuna." 

Hor. Sat., Liber 11, Sat. VII. 

" Tho' modest, on his unembarrass'd brow 
Nature had written ' Gentleman.' " 

ByrorCs Don Juan, 

" His very name a title-page, and next 
His life a commentary on the text." 

Woodbridge, 

In view of the commendable patience witli which I must 
imagine my readers to have followed the subjects (hard 
ones, too) presented in the last number, I feel under obli- 
gations to change the bill of performances, and offer in 
place of clap-trap and burlesque, a Httle of the legitimate 
drama. I will not pretend to decide what impressions have 
been produced by the characters thus far introduced, nor 
so far insult the public judgment as to suppose it has been 
very much misled as to the real kinds and classes whose 
delineations have been attempted. It is a mournful, though 
no less true fact, that of those who represent what is ac 
cepted by the world as our leading aristocracy, three-fifths 
may be safely set down, to a certain extent, as positive cari- 
catures. See how they come in and by lohat — how they 
figure for a while, and then disappear like bad odors. Pray 
what are the requisites, necessary to an admission, or rather 
6 



104 

so there be wealth, what is there that will positively entail 
the danger of black-balling ? Audacious must he be, who 
would propose lohat should justify public ostracism, and 
more wonderful his ingenuity, whose knowledge of fashion- 
able ethics would enable him to lay down a chart of the 
modern moral qualifications. Is not Society, in its recogni- 
tion of those justly interdicted, guilty of a violation of the 
very principles upon which it stands, the evil influences of 
which must descend to the third and fourth generation ? 
Daily are our experiences shocked in being witnesses of the 
shameless impunity with which gilded vice is paraded be- 
fore us. Why do fathers barter their daughters' innocence 
and future happiness, for a few seasons of questionable 
splendor, and why do daughters shut their eyes against the 
mercenary prostitution, which their children beholding, 
" shall rise up and call them" cursed ? Let not this pre- 
sent calm and apparent acquiescence, be laid as a " flatter- 
ing unction" to the heart, for a time of fearful reckoning shall 
come for each particular sin, when penitential years, and 
tears of blood will fail to expiate the dread punishments 
that must ever folloiv rebellion against our common nature! 
Has a blight fallen upon the brain, or a paralysis upon the 
hands, that were wont to guide the pen for public censure ? 
Have the pernicious tides of wealth and effeminacy swept 
away, or risen above the landmarks of virtue and honor ? 
Let those go forth to the work of regeneration, who 
are not dead to the common decencies of their nature ; let 
them sprinkle the ashes of pui ification upon the unclean 
spirits of the time; let the appalling shades of this far- 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 105 

reaching Upas, whose poisonous clamp is penetrating and 
withering the fruits of purity and truth, be banished hence- 
forth by the consuming fires of an honest indignation, or else, 
forever bid farewell to all the unutterable tenderness with 
which we remember a mother's love and prayers, a sister's 
disinterested aifection, or a wife's absorbing devotion. Let 
this moral leprosy be purged from the land, or let the nation 
in sackcloth, become a mourner at the tomb of departed 
Virtue! From these thoughts of a soil where thrives so 
rankly the ''root of all evil," turn we gladly to pleasanter 
pictures. In presenting the study of a subject that is se- 
parated with what I trust will prove a most agreeable dis- 
tinctness, from the characters that have occupied the pre- 
ceding sketches, there has been a very strong temptation to 
surrender for the occasion the plan hitherto proposed and 
adhered to, and instead of drawing a purely fictitious cha- 
racter, allow my pen the unusual license of recording 
the remembrances of one whose charming idiosyncrasy 
will ever be indellibly in my "mind's eye." But no 
— one lapse from the firm determination to avoid personali- 
ties, and good-by to good resolutions; so I will satisfy 
myself with a view of the (to use a favorite expression of 
the illustrious Kossuth) •' solidarity of the peoples^ and 
strike an average thereof. Yet, desirous as I am of pre- 
serving consistency, it is not improbable that the leading 
feature in this chapter will be more strongly colored with 
actual reminiscences than I could wish for ; and if such 
should be the case, in view of the contingency of " coffee 
fur one," I would invoke a little deadly precision for a hand 



106 NEw-YOKK aristocracy; or, 

quite out of practice, and vvofully unsteadied by late hours 
and strong cigars, -vviLh somewhat the same spirit that the 
fellow did, when previous to closing in with a big bear, he 
made the following apostrophe : " Lord, there is goin' to 
be one of the biggest * bar' fights that ever you did see, 
and Loid, if you ain't on my side, for God's sake don't 
be on the ' bars!' " The anecdote is a regular grandfather, 
but the idea came pat to my position, and I made free to 
use it. Our hero, Mr. Frank Warewell, is full of anec- 
dotes, and good ones, too, and a walking volume of good 
sayings, choice saws, sage apothegms, and ''horresco refe- 
rens ;" a thorough-paced, unmitigated, and original — 
PUNSTER! I hope the announcement has not already 
prejudiced him with the prejudging public; it is no fault of 
his, if nature forces him to affix a dozen significations to a 
word, in which ordinary minds can find but one. Frank is 
a perfect air-pump on language, and will, in a given space 
of time, exhaust any given word, or words, or phrase, or 
sentence, of their different and latent meanings as com- 
pletely as the doctors draw oft" deadly compounds from 
the stomachs of those who have taken that process to ''step 
out.'' The equivoque in his case, by inclination and long- 
habit, is confirmed into a second nature, and he can no more 
shake it off at will than can the dog his tail. Of course, 
his friends understand the incurable nature of his complaint, 
and deal gently with so pardonable a weakness ; many, 
however, fall victmis, by infection, to the same disease, and 
among them those whom you would almost as soon expect 
to find guilty of highway robbery as a double entendre. A 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 107 

certain great man (and tlie greatest are liable to mistakes) 
has sent Lis fiat against punning, by condemning it as the 
lowest species of wit ; now, had he lived in the times of 
Mr. Warewell, his conviction would likely have been 
much changed by the perfection to which that gentleman 
has brought the practice of a " phiy upon words." Many, 
doubtless, have endeavored to immortalize themselves by 
this rare accomplishment, who failed most signally, from 
want of capacity, and that natural adaptation, which has 
rendered Warewell's graceful ambiguities successful to a 
proverb. There is a way, I take it, of reducing all those sort 
of things to a science : more so, at any rate, than people gen- 
erally beheve ; and the mind concentrating its energies con- 
tinually on one subject, and matters legitimately pertaining 
thereto, will necessarily acquire a facihty and acumen that 
is quite as astonishing to the uninitiated as are the " hocus 
pocus" and "presto, change," that puzzle the brains of 
youthful visitors, after their first evenings with Anderson, 
the " Wizard of the North." In this particular line of hu- 
mor, Frank is entirely at home, but no more so than in a 
general impromptu cleverness, that renders his peculiar 
talents in general demand. Most unquestionably, in the 
Temple of Fun, he is the Mngnus Apollo, while the crowd 
of clumsy mimics, who aspire to bring their votive offerings, 
may be likened unto crude catechumens that throng tl:e 
outer shrine. How vain would be the attempt here to 
furnish even specimens of the many good things which he 
has the credit of havinjr said, althouoh I understand he is 
anything but flattered by being supposed the author of 



108 

sundry stupidities, that have been pushed off on the publiC; 
with a forgery of his endorsement to save them from im- 
mediate sepulture. He therefore objects to '* casting his 
bread on the waters, that it may return to him after many 
days," because (as he says) it would make his cake all 
*' dough.'' However ^ye may regard this kind of talent, or 
however much we may question the utility of asserting it 
worthy of emulation, still, its very inoffensiveness, pleads 
strongly for a lenity of judgment. Grant it, if you will, an 
*' ignis fatuus," yet still an innocent one. Pure and un- 
defiled wit, by which I mean the sparkling and polished 
pleasantry of ideas as opposed to that of words, is invested 
with a mysterious and subtle beauty, which at once estab- 
hshes its claims to superiority. But alas ! if it be beautiful, 
how much of cruelty and bitterness often go with it, and of 
the many true words which the old proverb tells us are 
** spoken in jest," how many of them are indebted for their 
pungency to lurking mahce, and venomous spite. Fortu- 
nately, I suppose the age we live in is not a peculiarly sensi- 
tive one, and that the barbed and glittering shaft with which 
the satirist expects to pierce the vices of the day to quick- 
ened torture, will likely rebound with blunted point from 
the tough and scaly fibres of the moral epidermis. Those 
who wish to castigate the crowd, must remember the times 
as they are ; the bare spots change about ; therefore let 
them lay on only where it will tell, else will their labor be 
lost. If you are the aggressor, my friend, and are deter- 
mined to gain your end, there is no better advice for you 
than that which King Philip received from the Oracle, the 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 109 

excellence of which was plainly proven to him in various 
subsequent operations : 

Let the officers of Public Mint look to it that their issues 
are of true weight, for in this age of Brass, if the circulat- 
ing medium is not corrupted, it will be from no want of op- 
portunity for galvanic manipulation, but rather from a me- 
tallic purity which shall baffle alloy. Mr. Warewell's wit is 
of that kind which is easily understood, but scarcely to be 
described. His colloquial powers grow upon you most 
agreeably, and yet unexplainably ; one hardly knows 
whether it be the matter or the manner, or both united, or 
something else entirely different, or else perhaps not differ- 
ent, but experienced through some new medium. So it is 
in listening with choking ecstacy to the ravishing vibrations 
of music, that sink deep in the innermost soul ; a hidden but 
vital chord may be struck, with a power like the electric 
shock, awakening the whole order of sensibilities, and yet 
the whole produced by agencies we wot not of nor per- 
chance ever shall. With a little alteration, what Goldsmith 
said of Garrick, may be also applied to Frank : 



describe him who can, 



An abridgement of all that (is) pleasant in man ; 
As (a punster), confess'd without rival to shine ; 
As a wit, if not first, in the very first line." 

Our hero's manners are modelled upon the hearty viva- 
city and respectful familiarity of the old school, which I am 
silly enough to prefer to the " mute, inglorious" hauteur of 



110 NEW-YOKK aristocracy; OR, 

our modern elegants, who are stately and shining, and cold 
as icebergs, seemingly apprehensive that a little thaw and 
graciousness will destroy their stiff, shirt-collar dignity, and 
make it tumble down like a basket of butcher's meat. Frank 
is polite enough to avail himself of the advantages of a little 
flattery now and then (which never hurts anybody), and if, 
occasionally, he *' cuts it a little too thick," it is a mistake 
much more easily forgiven than the contrary. People may 
rail against the practice as much as they please (sometimes 
they are afraid of being suspected a little open themselves on 
that point), but so long as human nature remains the same, 
my doctrine will be found to be tolerably orthodox. It must 
be acknowledged that Frank does not use all the discrimina- 
tion he might, as regards the recipients of the " honey heavy 
dew" of his sweet things ; or, in plain English, he flatters too 
imiversally, to save himself from an imputation of insincer- 
ity. He is a professor of too rnany of the shining accom- 
plishments, to make superficiality of knowledge in some a 
matter of much wonderment. Should he husband his ta- 
lents, to concentrate them on this point, doubtless he would 
attain the distinction of a most scientific complimenteur. As 
it is, he is an Americanized Chesterfield, with a generous, 
open democracy of manner, better suited to the times and 
our " peculiar institutions," than that fine filagree polish, so 
elaborately traced on the hard and unyielding enamel of the 
old English model. Warewell thinks himself under obhga- 
tions to do the agreeable, under all circumstances, for, as he 
says, he has so long enjoyed the/m;^A;-ing privileges, that 
it is but a small return if he strives, to the best of his ability, 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. Ill 

to repay the debt of gratitude. In society, he invariably 
manages (and herein we must acknowledge the catholicity 
of his taste) to monopolize either the cleverest or best look- 
ing women. How he contrives to do this without giving 
offence to the stars of lesser magnitude, is one of the secrets 
of his peculiar diplomacy. On this account he has to play 
a difficult, and sometimes dangerous game. He who un- 
scathed can run the gauntlet of feminine predilection, may 
be safely set down as one of the lucky kind. Yet Frank 
manages all these things, like a skillful general, and makes 
many a strong point where most people would lose. And 
here is seen the efficacy of his panacea — his nostrum of 
mellifluous words ! Perhaps theie is no place in which he 
is seen to greater advantage than at the Spiings. I am in- 
clined to think that Saratoga Avas made for hira expressly ; 
and when he shall have gone higher up, visitors need not 
be surprised if the Springs themselves should dry up. It is 
there (whether from local influences, or the saline pungency 
of Congress Water, I cannot say) that the best elements of 
his nature develop themselves. How incomplete, without 
him, would be the promenade — the '* ten pin" parties — ex- 
cursions to the lake — soiree du bal, and bal masque ! Char- 
ley Menshun, on one occasion, in the United States bar 
room, having stated that he thought that Frank was going- 
it with a RUSH, was immediately asked up to drink, and ac- 
cepted. Warewell's candor, integrity, and offhand clever- 
ness, causes him to be in great demand as referee in disputes, 
and speechifier in geneijd. He is great, truly great, at 
improvisation, poetical recitations, impioptu addresses, in 
6- 



112 NEW- YORK ARISTOCRACY ; OR, 

fact, in every thing that comes under social stump-speaking. 
Many well recollect the melting pathos of his address, when 
a certain notable young man united himself with one Miss 
Hats. It is said the young lady's papa was so much over- 
come either by the speech, or the heat, or heeltaps, that 
he forthwith unloosed his oriental treasure — his (as Fiank 
says) ** bosom's lord," a very Koh-i-noor in green — and in- 
sisted on presenting it. What a triumph for eloquence 
AND EMERALDS ! ! For further information I am authorized 
to refer the curious to " Morris," Marvins' renowned head 
waiter, whose evidence, though somewhat highly colored, 
may be relied on. Would that I were privileged to intro- 
duce here the touching stanza he indited when "Young 
America" ran off and mariied his chambermaid. Those 
who remember Mrs. Leo Hunter's lines to a frog, expiring 
on a log, may faintly conceive the melting tenderness with 
which the poet alludes to so romantic a union. Young 
Hopeful's father was so overcome, that the anger of a dis- 
appointed ambition gave way, and on the author's conclud- 
ino- the address, came forward, and grasping Frank's hand, 
exclaimed, in choking accents, (his mind fresh from a recent 
perusal of the prices of pork) «' That's mess ! !" In that 
phrase, one with which he manages to interlard most of his 
conversations, old Piggot expressed the quintescence of ad- 
miration. Frank has confessed that he was apprehensive tliat 
he had been a little premature, or, to use his own words, 
that he had " cut it a little too fat,'' and that he was greatly 
relieved when the old gentleman held out the olive branch. 
When that tailor's beauty, Mr. Washerlon Chopstitch, 



GEMS OF JAPONIOA-DOM. 113 

united his fortunes with Miss Teterty Cowslip, whose artifi- 
cial verticality can result only from long intemperance in 
ramrod tea, our friend Warewell, getting inspired, again 
essayed, and clomb Parnassus heights to weave a chaplet 
for the blushing biide ; with what success, the reader may 
judge for himself, by reading the annexed, which, though 
not intended for the public, I have taken the liberty of pre- 
senting, without the author's knowledge or consent. 

TO 
MISS TETERTY C , ON HER BRIDAL EVE,. 

sweetest cowslip ! on this happy night 

My muse, emboldened, dares to claim her right, 
And draw the veil that hides thy virgin heart, 
To prove that JVature is excelled by j^rt, 

1 know perfections such as thine demand ; 
A graphic power, denied my feeble hand, 

Yet still through all Ihy beauty can impart 
What JVatu7-e could not give, but only ^rt. 

By the rich blush that on thy face glows deep, 
In colors standivg as the apple's cheeli ; 
We learn, alas! how beauty must depart, 
Unless we, JVature, cover o'er with ^rt. 

Or in the heavings of thy faultless bust, 
(O ! skill immortal of the " upper crust !") 
We still may see, and lay it much to heart, 
That Nature's " some," when she is raised by Art. 

There, take my blessings ! May thy husband find 
Congenial pleasure in a " model mind !" 
Still love thee dearly as his better part— 
No flower of Nature, but a gem of Art. 



lltt NEW-YORK aristocracy; ( E, 

And when in future years, with children blesf, 
A peerless matron thou shall stand confessed, 
Engrave this lesson on the youthful heart — 
That Nature's nothing, by the side of Art. 

Ned F , a great friend and admirer of Frank's, asked 

him what made him write verses of so equivocal a nature, 
and was answered, that " they were suggested after having 
made a very good thing in cotton." Ned is of the old set, 
one of the right kind, and a fine pattern of a class now 
mostly extinct. I understand, in case of Frank's stepping 
out, Ned will do the posthumous honors ; if so, success 
attend this modern Boswell, and may his labors be amply 
repaid. 

It would have afforded me great pleasure to have con- 
tinued my sojournings amid the various spots consecrated 
bv the wanderings of our hero, but having consulted the 
limits of space I find no chance of being accommodated. It 
would be hardly fair, though, after having thus briefly can- 
vassed Mr. Warewell's mental and moral attributes, to with- 
hold altogether a description of their earthly tabernacle. 
Frank has even enjoyed the reputation of being one of the 
handsomest men of the age — not one of your sleek-faced, 
figure-head, block model of St. Anthony beauties (with 
no more soul or expression than are on the waxen mugs 
of figures one sees through big plate-glass windows, in bar- 
bers' shops, slowly revolving on their axis), but a counten- 
ance, interesting from its character, and from the air of 
natural refinement, that speaks from every lineament. His 
cast of features arc eaiinently distinguished and highly 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 115 

poetical — a blending of Praxitiles severity, with Guido's 
softer tints — his nose acquiline and aristocratic, his eye ever 
in a " fine phrenzy rolling," — 



whose beams might shame a night 



Of star-light gleams, they are so bright." 

Frank's crowning glory is in the luxuriance and quality 
of his hair — " hyperion locks" — that gleam in their waving 
masses of glossy purple, as the golden harvest, under 
an Autumn sun. If you would catch a little of the Pro- 
methean fire in his eye, ask him his opinion of Louis Kos- 
suth. Mr. Van Dunk says, he would be magnificent in 
'* Lucia," as the master of Ravenswood. Van Dunk is a 
perfect musical embodiment — or •* music run mad." He 
has probably the finest amateur voice in the country, with 
great cultivation, and unexceptionable method. He can 
give you a critical account of all the great operas, and illus- 
trate their chiefer beauties, with his own matchless organ. 
He is always at the opera, as if it were a duty — and would 
be almost as much missed as the great impressario — Max. 
The Artists stand in awe of his fiat, as they would of Beeth- 
hoven's. He is known (from strong personal resemblance 
to Wellington) as the " duke," and is in truth a plaguy 
handsome fellow. Mrs. Jouncer, who is a fine musician and 
great approver of Van [)unk, thinks it a great pity the 
public should be deprived of his talents. 



116 NEw-YOEK aristocracy; or, 



CHAPTER X. 

Nil parvum, aut humili modo, 
Nil mortale loquar. 

Horace — Carminum — Lib. ill. — Ode xix. 

I QUESTION very much whether Mrs. Lavender feels half 
as badly in having been deprived, even till this time, of the 
immortality a notice in these sketches will probably secure 
to her, as I do. The disposition of an author's subjects is 
not always in his control, and in the desultory nature of this 
work, it has been frequently the case that to maintain a 
certain average, both people and places have been intro- 
duced which otherwise would gladly have been avoided. 
Some specimens have crept in that were better rejected, but 
they would have been so at the expense of a certain fidelity 
to which I pledged myself in the beginning. Mrs. Lav- 
ender, like a winter apple, (though not a greening by any 
means), is not of a quality to spoil by keeping ; on the con- 
trary, it would seem that, like the vinous extract, time only 
adds to, and develops her many excellencies. I have no 
doubt that theie are many, very many ladies, now, who 
would be glad if they could only make me write out Mrs. 
L.'s history according to their own dictation : in which case 
heaven help that poor lady ; if there should be anything left 
of her, it would not be their fault. Like all women who are 
popular among gentlemen, she is proportionably the reverse 




Mr. r^av;;"<ler retiirning rather late from the '-boar.r^ is made a witness of the man 
ner m wh,ch a lonely wife consoles herself during the husband's absence. 



GEMS OF JAPONIC A-DOM. 11 T 

amongst her own sex ; but I have no idea of gratifying the 
jealous spleen of her envying enemies, by indulging in whole- 
sale denunciations, in which there would be neither justice nor 
humanity. Mrs. Lavender may not be exactly a divine em- 
anation of perfection, any more than most other persons; but 
that is no reason why, since she generally acts very independ- 
ently and without reference to certain standards, that others 
have assumed to appoint she should therefore be held up as 
a fit mark for the launching at of senseless ridicule or stupid 
execration. It is more magnanimous, at all events, to take 
the weaker side, if it be not positively bad, and it is most de- 
voutly to be hoped, that those who are always so anxious 
to swell, with brazen throats, the "hue and cry," will one 
day, themselves, be hunted to their filthy lairs. Mrs. Lav- 
ender is a prominent character, a distinguished woman, from 
whose coterie proceedeth all manner of diverse and notable 
impressions. Visitors here, and those wretched inhabitants 
who are yet without the pale, are led in some way to look 
upon her as the acknowledged, but unapproachable god- 
dess of the " Upper Ten ;" one upon whom the dignity of a 
social apotheosis has been conferred by a unanimous viva 
voce, and accepted as if by the " divine right of kings." 
Such is the lady whose points, peculiarities, and parties, we 
are now about endeavoring to discuss, with as much impar- 
tiality as is possible. Li former allusions it has been seen 
how obnoxious she was to the Muskys, owing to their jeal- 
ousy of her superior attractions, as also the rancour with 
which she inspired Mrs. Fustian, by reason of refusing to 
be intimate with that intolerable piece of fat and flummery. 



118 NEW YOEK aristocracy; oe, 

It is unnecessary, however, to mention here, the names of 
all who have a " bone to pick" with Mrs. L. Their name 
is legion. The probable causes of their dislike may possi- 
bly be suspected, as we proceed to scrutinize more closely 
that lady's character, in which may be discovered the no un- 
usual combination of dignified reserve, (amounting at times 
to at least the appearance of actual hauteur) united to charm- 
ing affability and real ingenuousness ; I say real, but may be 
mistaken. If I am, then all I say is, that it is the very best 
imitation since the " counterfeit presentment " of aristoc- 
racy, by which the reader may recollect old Fustian was so 
egregiously duped. My own belief is, that her smiles are 
not heart's hypocrites — ghastly types of deceit, with which 
to ensnare unsophisticated goodness ; they are possessed of 
too much warmth and natural beauty, and irradiate the face 
with too truthful a glory, to spring entirely from dissembled 
causes. There is a depth of simplicity, which artful guile 
can with little difficulty compass, but the shrewd studier of 
human nature is not so easily hoodwinked. 

To the quick, accustome 1 eye, how easy to detect natural 
from artificial flowers ; mechanical ingenuity may have 
almost destroyed identity, in respect to botanical accuracy, 
and perfumes blended as exquisitely sweet as those that 
tempt the bee, yet in the lifeless gloss that but mocks the 
vitality of vernal hues, or in the palsied tremulousness of 
fluttering leaves, that seeks to imitate the "aspen's quiver- 
ing shade," how plain is the penumbra of Nature. In thus 
pleading Mrs. Lavender's sincerity, I would not have it sup- 
posed for a momrnt, that slie is such an entire simpleton, as 



GEMS OF JAPONIC A-DOM. 119 

not to know the use of disguise, as well as to practice it 
when necessary. For instance, when a certain gentleman, 
who even finds it difficult to make himself endured, by 
back-biting indiscriminately, hangs like an ape over her 
box at the Opera (suggesting to the audience, the story of 
Beauty and the Beast,) she can smile him in ten minutes 
into such a state of folly, that when he looks in the glass, 
on retiring that night, he will forget that he was solicited by 
Mr. Niblo, duiing Mazetti's illness, to attempt, unmasked, 
the delineation of a certain Brazilian character, and may 
dream, perchance, of the mythological loves between ani- 
mals, and the human race divine. Mrs. Lavender can smile 
at such a man, but it will be a smile of derision, coupled with 
contempt at a style of manners of the most disgusting 
presumption, to which is added a meagre understanding, 
with the most inordinate vanity. Imagine, if you can, such 
a hbel on humanity as this, positively possessed with 
the idea, that he can plume himself on having made un- 
happy that ravishing piece of womanly perfection ! Bah ! 
Could she, but for a moment, be brought to suppose that 
Joe Blackface had dared to so far insult her dignity and good 
taste, as even to entertain, though secretly, such thoughts in 
regard to her, I believe in her indignation, she would for- 
get her usually classical composure, and kick the scullion 
across the square. Think of such a sight as that 1 — the im- 
perturbable Mrs. L., driven to desperation by such a dog, 
and venting her vengeance in a pedal energy that might 
drive him for safety to the very fountain itself. What a 



120 NEW- YORK aristocracy; or, 

subject for the pictorial talent of the age ! or for the Ravels 
to embody in tableaux vivant. I leave it open for the Pi- 
cayune, or Lantern ; a generosity I have no doubt they 
will dul}^ appreciate. If Mrs. L. could have been indicted 
for permitting about her a public nuisance, she would long 
since have been obliged to answer before our public tribu- 
nals. So much for Mr. Blackface. 

Among the first occasions I had to use Mrs. Lavender's 
name, I stated, I believe, that she was the prominent repre- 
sentative of the note-shaving aristocracy, and might have 
added also the fact of her being a very princess among the 
" Bulls" and *' Bears." Her influences, no doubt, are felt in 
fluctuations of the " fancies," and direct in a measure the 
capricious councils of the board of brokers, whose decisions 
are " httle by starts, and nothing long." Except the uniniti- 
ated, how few of those human bees who are buzzing the 
year round in the different hives in Wall Stieet, can calcu- 
late the immense power emanating from Mrs. Lavender's pri- 
vate boudoir, and acting thence secretly, but surely, through 
her banks and brokers. As to negotiating government 
loans, that to her is a plain, straight forward achievement, 
which she feels would be throwing away her talents to be- 
come interested in ; but give her the opportunity of mani- 
festing a delicate or deep laid finesse, such as throwing out 
baits that will allure even the veterans, or by some bold and 
astonishing coup d'etat, overwhelming her opponents, and 
securing an entire monopoly, and she will then prove her- 
self the superior tactitian, which she most decidedly is. It 
is said that nothing requires more nerve and moral courage 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 121 

than this same business of heavy speculation. Thus, I sup- 
pose we may account in a measure, for Mrs. L.'s independent 
hardihood of character, that dares to set aside the old land- 
marks, and stick up stakes for itself. You can see calcula- 
tion and courage in everything she does. Had the Empress 
Josephine been a person of our 'heroine's calibre, Napoleon 
might have found domestic fires, from which flight would 
have been more necessary, than from the flames of Moscow. 
This boldness and originality distinguish her from others 
who, perhaps, have aspirations quite as lofty, but who are \ 
content to take the beaten track, and so be obliged to 
slowly swallow the dust kicked up by the thousand and 
one who have preceded them. Mrs. Lavender would reach 
the same goal by a dash straight across the country, saving 
half the time and distance, and by her gallant and unique 
style, set aside the ordinary rules of criticism, carry every 
thing before her : — " ferat palmam qui meruit." Under dif- 
ferent circumstances, Mrs. L. would have been a matchless 
Di Vernon. She has all the talent, beauty, and resolution 
to make a regular rural dare-devil, that would have excelled 
in the steeple-chase and kindred sports, which, to this day, 
have their devotees among the bright-faced ladies of our dear 
mother Britannia. If the principles of Bloomerisra did not 
involve so many points at war with true delicacy and refine- 
ment, I could easily conceive what an irresistible disciple 
Mrs. Lavender would make. As it is, could she be induced 
to do anything in such bad taste (which is quite impossible,) 
as to adopt this system, and come out en pantelottes, think 
of the thousands who would be glad to be proselyted by 



122 NEW-YORK aristockacy; or, 

such a charmer. But the formal, unbending dynasty that 
reigns like a despot in this big village of ours, is no place 
for tolerating anything of that kind. The loftiest, yea, the 
peerless Mrs. Lavender herself, must, like St. John, cry out 
that '* one cometh who is greater" than her, even FASH- 
ION, that potent Pythoness, who dispenseth to the faithful 
in her ranks, the orders that may not be disregarded with 
impunity. If our heroine stands in awe of nothing else, she 
certainly, for some reason, fails not in allegiance to the im- 
perious exactions of this modern Cleopatra. Mrs. Lavender 
can't be gossiped out of fancies ; but the force of education, 
in compelling her to subscribe to Fashion's formulary, is but 
another illustration of the inconsistencies in human reason. 
As a people advance in age and civilization, the bonds of their 
peculiar usages are extended and riveted, till the whole 
structure is confined in adamantine chains, that shall likely 
survive the political code which sways the whole. So much 
is said and preached in the present day of the instability of 
governments, (a truism so plain, that " he who runs may 
read") and so little consideration seems attached to the ele- 
mentary principles of society, that philanthropy might be 
worse employed than in diverting the propositions of gene- 
ral amelioration from their stereotype channels, into such as 
may chance to lead to more successful results. Take the 
example of any nation on the civilized globe, and trace its 
history to where it fades in the dim and imperfect light of 
tradition, and we shall find with its descendants ofltimes no 
data of Q, political system, hviiever, (no matter how modified 
by the anarchism of Time,) retaining the primary character 



GEMS OF JAPONIC A- DOM. 123 

of its social nationality ! Habits of thought, and the intense 
passion of a ruling piide, are as hereditary as language, 
which, though shorn of pristine purity, and sunk to a 
wretched ;:>a/o/5, will still afford the curious philologist a 

clue to derivation 

In respect to INIrs. Lavender's dinners, they may be pro- 
nounced unexceptionable. She of course presides, for it is 
not her province to be anywhere save at the head. At the 
foot, as vice president, sits the next in command, (not Mr. 
Lavender, of whom no notice has as yet been taken, out of 
consideration to his wife's feelings) a sort of feminine Secre- 
tary of State, the sister of mine hostess, rejoicing, mid a pro- 
fusion of smiles, under the soubriquet of Mrs. Hoories. Mrs. 
Hoories, as her name would indicate, is a funny woman, of im- 
mense attractions — a fac-simile, in purest plaster, of Mrs. L. 
— with great profusion of curls, and color, and a neck — " Ye 
gods ! it doth amaze me." When these ladies sit down to din- 
ner, with eighteen feet of mahogany separating them, and a 
dozen of the most notable young scaramouches as company, I 
wonder if they ever recur to the time when, by the light of a 
/farthing dip," they strained their visuals till the small hours^ 
to fulfil an engagement with " The Ladies' Depositary." Un- 
prejudiced persons would hardly think that such matters 
ever mingled with their retrospect. It is said that during the 
late cramp and panic in the money market, Mrs. Lavender's 
house suddenly found itself obliged to suspend; a friend, on 
hearing this, came forward to ofi'er his condolements, and 

express his sympathy ; " D your sympathy," replies 

the *' firm," *' if we owe you anything, bring on your ac- 



124: NEW-YOEK AKISTOCKACY ; OE, 

counts ! ! " Thus have we a key, unexpectedly furnished us, 
wherewith to guide our investigations among the laby- 
rinths of Wall Street diplomacy ! ! ! 

In having spoken of Mrs. Lavender's dinners, and her 
great ability in conducting and presiding over that popular 
species of domestic hospitality, we have done no more than 
simple justice requires. Every lady, it is expected (or at 
least hoped), should possess and practice some special 
virtue ; by every lady, I mean every distinguished lady, as 
that term is understood at the present time. Shining lights, 
such as Mrs. L. and others, who have served to illuminate 
these otherwise darkened pages, are expected very naturally 
to be the moral beacons of the age — lights placed upon high 
hills, " that they may be seen of all men." "With people 
of lesser note, who have to struggle against the influences 
of an obscure position, and fight perpetually the tempta- 
tions that poverty creates, it is not so much to be expected 
that they shall astonish the world with imhlic charities, or 
that they can afford to hire half a column of advertising in 
papers with the widest circulation, to announce that Mrs. 

, has founded an institution for the distribution of 

hot soup and cold potatoes, or that Mrs. , the wife 

of a highly benevolent gentleman, whose liberality (extrava- 
gance in his own establishment) is well known, has headed 
a subscription list to purchase red flannel shirts, with the 
/ liberal donation of $100.00. Charity, you know, should 
/ always commence at home, and therefore in the practice of 
'' this principle, Mrs. Lavender is beautiful in all the appoint- 
[ ments of her house, makes superb toilettes, has a choice box 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 125 

at the opera, drives to Stuart's with the full complement of 
outriders, half supports a certain vender of triie paste and 
imitation pearls, gives numberless dinners (and such din- 
ners !), is consulted by the principal men-milliners before 
they publish the almanac of fashion, and yet after all 
these extraordinary drains on her private generosity, it is a 
positive fact, (attested by twenty-five boarders at the Irving 
House, in Kossuth hats) that on two separate occasions, 
(during days that were bright, and warm, and genial, such as 
the poor pray for) she gave two silver sixpences, in person, 
to the old woman who formerly sat so much on the outer 
steps of the " marble palace," without so much as waiting for 
the equivalent in peanuts. Query : Was not this really the 
" old woman who lived in her shoe " ? Forlorn creature ! 
I have missed her these wintry months, from familiar haunts. 
Perhaps the gentle summer winds, in kindly prescience, 
foreseeing that she might not abide another season of ice, 
wafted her weary being to a clime where storms and sor- 
rows enter not in ; where youth may be unto her for ever ; 
we fervently hope so. In speaking of this act of benevo- 
lence to Frank, the other day, and how trifling, after all, 
were the good offices necessary to make the poor happy, he 
took occasion to quote, (as I thought,) with most forcible 
felicity, Pope's celebrated lines : 

" Man wants but little here below, 
Nor wants that Uttle long "' 

It was not important to our issues, that we should intro- 
duce Mr. Lavender in any other than a very informal man- 
ner. The ex'stence of a husband not being material in this 



126 NEW-YOEK ARISTOCRACY ; OR, 

instance to the lady, except as a mere matter of dimes, it 
would seem unnecessary to place his picture in juxtaposition. 
Neither is he a man to find fault with such an arranirement, 
being a pattern husband, who never finds fault, letting his 
wife do as she pleases in every respect, (which, by the by, 
is a way that most wives are hostile to !) Poor little man ! 
what a •* still, small voice" would be his, if ever raised in do- 
mestic council ; yea, a " tempest in a teapot." Is it not 
strange, that a man who has taken a " bull by the horns," 
or been in many a big " bear" fight, should feel himself un- 
able to take ground against a woman, strong only in the 
mysterious power which Nature has given her. The gen- 
tleman who has solved the problem of magnetic polarity, 
may, perhaps, explain the influences that attracted two such 
bodies as these. Imagine the consequences to the world and 
these two people, if Mr. L., instead of being led away by 
visions, 

" Like the celestial ladder seen 
By Jacob in his dream," 

he had remained bound up in the ethnicism of Wall street 
and its corruptions. After all, matrimony has affected his 
condition of mind and habit much less than hers. She had 
everything to gain and nothing to loose, unless it was all 
recollections of how she then lived — while he, having every- 
thing but domestic happiness, was disposed to put up every- 
thing to gain it, which of course he did ! There are 

shares in a certain stock about these days, in Mr. Laven- 
der's possession, that I think he would gladly throw in the 
market ; and there are " fancy stocks" in which 1 behtve 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 127 

Mrs. Lavender would veiy gladly purchase shares. The 
par value of what Mr. L. would like to dispose of i-< not 
out of the gLiessin^r range of some shrewd specuiatois. who 
may have a little of the same kind on hand themselves, and 
the kinds in which Madam's ambition would be gratified in 
having her capital invested, mny possibly be suspected from 
the samples she keeps about her. Mrs. Lavender is a wo- 
man of sentiment ; Mr. Lavender is a man of stocks ; and 
therein lieth their differences, slight indeed, yet be tb.oy 
differences. 



•The doom was writt'-n, the decree w.is p.-ist 
Ere tlie foundation of the world was* cast." 




TC80 YD 



A iiKii-iiiiiy- ivcoption at Mrs. Hat- 



GEMS OF JArONICA-DOM. 129 



CHAPTEK XI. 

" Yivere si recte nescis, decede peritis. 
Liisisti satis, edisti satis atqae bibisti : 

Tempus abire tibi est, " 

Id EphtU of Horace, liber 2d, line 213. 

^^■ 

I do not know wlietlier other people liave tliought of it, 
but tlie idea has often occurred to ui)^ mind, that some of 
us have fulfilled, or are fulfilling our being more as vege- 
tables than as men or women. In this, I have no reference 
to such as from uncommon deficiency in brains, have been 
likened unto cabbages or clams ; of the existence of these, no 
one, I take it, is skeptical, but the class I allude to, germi- 
nate like a blade of grass, are subject to the various laws of 
development, and in due time reach matm-ity, and there 
stop, evidently having accomphshed the end and purposes for 
which they were created. Under this classification of human 
vegetables we are able to enumerate those who have (and 
very deservedly) obtained the credit of possessing consider- 
able cleverness; who, under a right system of education, 
might have gone on unimpeded in the com-ses of hfe's short 
cycle. " Thus far and no farther" are we allowed to com'ey 
our theories ; for just at that culminating point, Avhen we 
think the man is about to be invested with divinity, our men- 
tal glorification is brought to a disagreeable close, bv the 
8 



130 

yision of an uninviting excavation called the Grave ^ into 
Avhicli our dear idol is unceremoniously tumbled. For more 
than eighteen hundred centuries there has been a great deal 
of pains taken to make men beheve that hfe, its cause and 
end, were to be found in a book of traditions, but very httle 
effort to impress the truth that the only possible Revelation 
is contained in the sealed volume of Death, a book which 
must ever (unless through some as yet undiscovered agency) 
baffle man's boasted prerogative, and leave him as far from 
facts as he is full oi fancies ! 

Hi % ^ Hi H: Ht 

In looking at such a family as the Hats, I come to regard 
them as I do a fruit tree that has reached its maturity, or 
rather, that has some time passed it, and is scattering its rich 
yieldings to decay on earth's bosom, or showing, in such as 
its branches still retain, the shrivel and specks of incipient 
decay. The Hats have got their growth — a mushroom 
growth — have accomphshed their destiny, such as it is, and 
now like the ripened fruit should be picked and put away, 
or buried up decently in some out of the way place. Ware- 
well (the wretch), told me the earher bearings of this par- 
ticular tree were pretty handsomely " plucked," by those 
whose tastes run entirely on green fruits. " Arbor cog- 
noscitur a fructibus." — I consider the pattern of this family 
as the most striking in my gallery, and am conscious, pain- 
fully so, of my inability to offer anything but a most imper- 
fect and unartistic sketch of the original. With the previous 
subjects I did not feel this kind of restraint. On them I 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 131 

worked with perfect freedom, knowing tliat a daub of tinsel 
here, or a patch of poor pamt there, would do no great harm, 
pro^idsd the expression was preserved ; but here my hand 
falters, for a splash would spoil all. It Avill not be within our 
hmits to give each member of this most interesting family 
such extended notice as their individual importance would 
seem to demand. There is not one that would not furnish 
ample material for many a finely ^viitten page. Let it suf- 
fice them and the curious public, that all of them who may 
not be particularl}^ noticed, are altogether perfect and lovely 
to behold ; that the twain graces of the respected authors of 
their being have indeed fallen upon worthy " chips of the old 
block." We have to do more particularly with the distin- 
guished representative of the maternal branch, in whose per- 
sonal attributes are blended a majority of those distinguishing 
characteristics, woven so deeply in the bright Brussels pattern 
of what is known both to strangers and natives as the monied 
aristocracy — an aristocracy of houses and splendid carriages, 
of large diamonds and small dogs ; or in other words, that 
class of the elite whom all the hotel jehus are perfectly well 
acquainted A^dth, and whom they point out as lionesses to 
visitors who hire their services, in order to see Avhat is vul- 
garly termed the " elephant.'' There is nothing like the 
magic of money — and an extra fifty cents occasionally be- 
stowed on discriminating and communicative hackmen, is 
supposed to be not precisely the woi-st way to obtain the 
donor a reputation for extraordinary liberality, and perhaps 
other things equally flattering. I mention this en passant, 



132 NEAV-YOEK ARISTOCRACY ; OR, 

for the edification of those who hkely have been puzzled and 
astonished at the inscrutable publicity attained by sundry 
private characters. Fashionable notoriety is sometimes only 
obtained at a fearful exjDense, rendering thereby the severest 
economy in certain small but important mattei-s absolutely 
necessary : ^90wr exemple, if the amount of subscription and 

the name of the subscriber for the erection of Church, 

is to be published in the evening and morrdng papers, a five 
hundred dollar bill will reach tar beyond the walls of the 
saci'ed edifice ; but for a starving family that five shiUings 
would relieve from disease, perhaps from death — why, such 
matters should be the care of paid philanthropists ! What 
9^6 turn foY charity directed to such objects? 

Mrs. Hats is one of the rarest of the rare. A proximity to 
her person cannot but impress you with her very remarkable 
endowments. It is not merely her beauty, or manner 
(the former has been, the latter continues to be striking,) that 
assures one of this fact on first acquaintance ; but there is that 
in the words that drop from her mouth, be they on ever so 
common place subjects, that bespeak the essential character of 
the woman. Every thing about her is a coup-cVoeil. She 
actually reeks with fjishion, from the ribbons on her head to 
the rosettes on her shppers. Beck & Stuart have here a liv- 
ing advertisement of their rarest silks and laces, while Ball, 
and his brother Vender Tiffany, can well afford their gorge- 
ous hijouterie at cost, when lent to the adornment of so con- 
spicuous a personage. Of course there is nothing about her 
outfit that is not expensively luxurious ; but no matter what 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 133 

the simplicity of her toilette, how dead the silk gloss, how 
lack-lustre the precious stones and metals, no one seems dis- 
posed to file a bill of exception, or indeed to hazard the pos- 
sibility that " all is not gold that ghtters." Let any other 
lady be caught with a suspicious bracelet, or a dubious neck- 
lace, and her equivocal pretensions would soon be brought to 
the bull-ling of feminine assayers, who forming themselves 
into a Jury on Gems, would award a verdict that would gal- 
vanize the reputation of the innovator for the rest of her 
natural life. Women call conventions, and get up a fearful 
tirade about the infringement of their rights by men ; when 
if they would only stop clapper-clawing one another, and 
leave off then- infernal gossipping, they would find themsehes 
not only infinitely happier in all the relations of hfe, but 
the imaginary necessity of convoking fanatical caucuses, 
for the pm-pose of making fools of themselves gratuitously , 
altogether done away with. Woman sways the world quite 
enough to satisfy even inordinate vanity and ambition, 
and the majority of 7nen, in ci^'ilized countries, are not dis- 
posed to shackle any freedom proper to the sex. There is / 
no power more omnipotent than that which is vested in the / 
adorable majesty of a good and beautiful woman. No mat- / 
ter how wild and extravagant men become in their mania 
about Liberty, or how fost, by mistaking unrestrained licence 
for constitutional freedom, they may be declining to a fatal 
anarchy, there is yet no murmur of dissent at the mild conser" 
vativeism of the "weaker vessel," no conspiracies to dethrone 
the gentle incumbent of so dear a despotism. 



134: NEW- YORK ARISTOCRACY; OR, 

In respect to wearing imitation ornaments, there can be 
little objection offered, since it is in strict consonance with the 
pseiido principles, upon which om* immaculate classes are 
based. But when it comes to the matter of imitations of 
pure morals, and pure English, we do not feel called upon to 
endorse so unqualifiedly. If people have a fancy to indulge 
in the economy of stained glass, or highly refined paste, it 
being entirely a matter of taste, so innocent a gratification 
ought never to be refused ; but when they wish to trespass on 
the domains of certain cardinal virtues, or sinfully neglect the 
codes of Johnson and Mm'ray, the affair assumes an elemen- 
tary importance, that calls for rebuke from all who arc 
satisfied -s^dth the administration of affairs under the long 
existing system, and who have no desire to see Socinanism, or 
Greeleyism, or the like horrible monstrosities, creeping in like 
incendiaries, to light their unholy fires on household altai-s. 
If the regime adopted by Mrs. Hats (copied from a transatlan- 
tic model), Midi folloived by sundry others, lacking orig-inahty 
to strike out for themselves, should be unfortunate enough to 
gain a general concurrence, there would be in a short time no 
more naturality in Virtue, than there now is in Music ; and 
but for geographical demarcation and the star spangled ban- 
ner, strangers would be unable to decide whether they had 
fallen among the French, the Turks, the Spaniards, the Mor- 
mons, or perhaps in a nest to which a bird from each of those 
nations had brought a feather. 

Mi-s. Hats possesses neither civil or political patriotism; 
the luxuriant but sensitive plants she unearthed in the softer 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 135 

climates of the far East, to stock the genial vine-yards of her 
own heart, did not take kindly to the chill soil of republicanism- 
Her style is essentially oriental, modified of course, by certain 
necessary conventionalisms. Her habits of life, and tastes as 
shown in trifles, partake unmistakably of " Araby the land 
of the blest." You would suppose from her appearance, that 
like some of the Eastern ladies, she never went " uncovered." 
The pallor of her face is like that of vegetation, that has 
been entirely deprived of light ; I should say her natural 
complexion, which probably very few can know any thing 
about. On this point I question whether her husband's know- = 
ledge goes any further than yours, good reader, or mine. But 
those lady's maids, when they have a break with their mis- | 
tress, do tell such stories ! It is " positively shocking," dread- ■ 
ful to think of. Ergo^ never get " out " Tvith those sort of 
people if you can help it. It's a dangerous and poor plan to 
make confidantes of them any how; but sometimes they find 
out in unguarded movements, a little too much, and then the 
only thing left is to buy 'em over by telhng the lohole. If 
one of them will leave, better secure her with a pound, even 
if obliged to save on the pennies afterwards. My chamber- 
maid is faithful, ever by my side, and with a transparent can- 
dor that enables one to " see through her at a glance." I pray 
no one to think hard of me for this singular intimacy with my 
handmaiden, who after all is nothing more nor less than a 
very platonic telescope, as vide plate of the author's apart- 
ments at the commencement of the book. Whether she is 
Mahomedan in faith, is more than I will take upon me to say » 



136 NEW- YORK aristocracy; or, 

but if she has set her heart on a material Heaven, she is prob- 
ably as near Paradise as she ever will be. Perhaps Mi-s. H. 
got her notions in Calabria itself, where the doctrines and sj^s- 
tem Sybaritical ought to be understood, if they are any- 
Avhere. The book-sellers are waiting with no little impatience, 
the personal memoirs of this lady ; and as to the PubHc, it 
would be unnecessary to say that they look for such an event 
with much interest. Her experiences in both hemispheres 
would be the very thing we want now. The Eastern world, 
if subjected to the pohtical deluge which now impends, will 
almost lose its identity ; and the next generation would there- 
fore be particularly benefited by a history of those interesting 
countries, before volcanic fii-es shall have destroyed, or black- 
ened the features of its ancient face. By the way, tells 

me she did Avrite some very admired letter about the places 
we are speaking of. But she was a younger woman then ; and 
though her descriptions of scenery may have been fresher, 
there was 3'et lacking the opportunity of offering comparative 
views, such as she might now, after having studied our insti- 
tutions properly. 

I have been told that Mrs. H's. adventures abroad border 
very closely on the marvellous ; that her acquaintance with 
Emirs, Sultans, and Grand Turks, has been of the most 
remarkable nature ; that the efit^ct of her dazzling beauty 
upon the simple-minded Arabs of the Desert, was such as to 
produce a voluntary homage little short of idolatry ; that had 
she accepted a moiety of the superb Cashmeres, jewelled 
crosses and daggers, and a thousand other of the ornate and 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 13 T 

beautiful subjects of Oriental ingenuity, she would have suf- 
ficient to realize a handsome fortune, independently of the 
vast income secured by a monopoly in hat-trimmings. There 
is an unswerving placidity in her manner, which could only 
have been obtained by one who had endeavored to find a 
model in stud}nng the smooth and piqued majesty of the 
Egyptian Pyramids. There is a benignity that seems to be 
always apostrophizing itself, by saying, " is there any possi- 
bility of people mistaking this air of classical repose for a 
want of vitality in the arterial circulation ?" or, " am I not old 
enough to be well satisfied that no miserable, splenetic indivi- 
dual would ever care to trouble himself about my real ex- 
traction, when he sees so much benignity, so much conde- 
scension, and a mind so easily obli\ious of the past ?" Dear, 
candid, confessing creatm-e that she is ! 

How edifying is this humiliation in " purple and fine 
linen ;" how ever to be admired this self depreciation in the 
chair of state ! Is not the meekness and suftering of these 
human demi-gods worthy of emulation ? Is it not a blessed 
condition of things, that we human cats are allowed to gaze 
with satisfaction on the kings and queens of fashion ? — that 
although we are not permitted to test our buoyancy in the 
sparkling stream, we may yet from the bank side feast our 
eyes on the '• .'ipples" that float thereon ? How happy those 
who with calm restraint can watch the venturing crowd that 
are dashing mid whirhng eddies adown the stream of life ? 
entermg into the interests of each struggler without feeling a 
temptation to make one of the eager throng ? Bravo ! bravo ! 
8* 



138 

What a broad field is open in our days to the daring aspi- 
rant ! Of course money is all necessary, if the aim is for 
something extra-distinguished ; but we have known smaller 
pretensions and slenderer purses succeed equally well. Half 
the battle is not to be, but to seem to be : if you have no basis 
/ for your superstructure, tax your imagination, which, after a 
little proper cultivation and discipline, will prove tractable and 
accommodating to the last degree, making you possessor in 
fee of so many blocks of brown stone houses, all castles in 
the air. If imagination does not prove sufficiently substan- 
tial, why, enter the list in gauds and trinkets : never be dis- 
heartened by Mse modesty, that enemy of the aspiring 
heart. Perhaps you are too poor to <jive entertainments ; 
Avell, then, go to entertainments. If driving or riding is too 
expensive, go up and down in omnibuses, and jump into the 
carriage of a friend : no matter whether he looks pleased ; 
yo2i are, and that is the most important. If yatching is the 
order of the day, why of course a poor man can't give it a 
thought ; so do as they who 

" liire apculler, and wLen once aboard 

Grow sick, and damn the climate like a Lord." 

Only ha^■e enough impudence and the deed is half accom- 
plished. It Avill be an imposing encyclopedia (this im]ui- 
dence), which will be accepted as a substitute for most any 
and e^'erything. If you find it impossible to go on without 
assistance, take the cue from some one who started just as 
low down as you, but who has gone straight forward, with 
an QjQ singled to his maik, up — uj^ — up, like the eaglcto 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 139 

liis eyrie. What would tlie Hats have clone, and "where 
would they have been now, had they allowed the circum- 
stances of an humble origin, that " pons asinorum," to be an 
obstacle to their progress ? Who would have helped them, 
if they had not helped themselves ? and I am yet to 
learn that we are li^^ng in an age when a man may expect 
any assistance save that which he finds in the brave purpose 
of his own strong heart. What superb imitations of sympa- 
thy the world is constantly getting up ; and how easy to ob- 
tain it in exchange for gold ! but tell us, thou inscrutable 
(Edipus, Human Nature ! how may we secure, for a solace in 
this woe-laden pilgrimage, one sincerely honest heart, that 
shall throb in unison with our own, while both 

" Like muffled (bnims are beating 
Funeral marches to the grave." 

It may have been a source of disappointment to some that 
ISIr. Hats should not have come in for his share of the family 
biography. I should be sorry to displease any one about 
such a matter; but I think on second thoughts they will 
think with me, that any thing which I might ofter concerning 
that individual, would be an act of supererogation, seeing that 
he is most emphatically one of the kind who " speak for them- 
selves," and whose great deeds are heralded in his own 
greater words. He is his own headstone (especially vn\\\ a 
brick in his hat) — " (sui) monumentum ?eris ;" and his im- 
mortal deeds are attested by the million tiles that coxeri 
alike the heads of the illustrious and obscure. Genin is the 
only man that is likely ever to dispute the palm of " fur and 



140 ]NEW-YORK ARISTOCKACY ; OK, 

felt !" Genin, the renowned patron of Kossuth and Jenny Lmd, 
the originator of the true occipital symmetry — may he, his bea- 
vers, and bounties, ever be continued to us ! Two himdred 
years hence, the liberty caps which now adorn our flag* staffs, 
may be ascribed to the patriotism of the united intellects of 
Genin and Hats ! 




TCUD^'^ 



Mrs. (.ahl.y. alllioii^ii aUurl.r.l in Mr. !i<nvi,z.T. is not entirely un<M,nsci<.ii> ..f ratiivia's 
.p.'i-ations upon a gontlcman who livos on tlir iiilnvs, of liis money. Miss Murky seein- 
o liavo ?;iiii:src-stc(l to a gentleman l.eliind lier eiialr some oi' "'riie n-e- «\' l.eauty." 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 141 



CHAPTER XII. 

Quid rides ? mutato nomine de te 
Tabula narratur. 

First of Hot. Sat., Line 69. 

So you are the author of that celebrated and vahiahle 
work entitled " Condition of Crocodiles in the Nile, at high 
and low tides, by A. Homtzer"; well, that is amply suf- 
ficient : I feel authorized in saying that Mi^. Gabby will be 
delighted in having you introduced to her matin musical 
All literary gentlemen, especially young ones, and such as 
are supposed not to be sworn enemies of matrimony, are 
always most welcome at Old Frizzletop's soirees. " Old and 
young Frizzletop," is usually poetically substituted by the 
young men when they allude to the charming Gabby and 
daughter. How can they be regarded as otherwise than a 
pair of disinterested philanthropists, who seem to have been 
born for the particular purpose of making young men under- 
stand the vastly superior attractions of ladies' society over 
clubs and such like abandoned places ! Isn't the old tabby's 
management quite as significant as if announced in so many 
words ? and did you ever leave the society of her and her 
daughter without saying to youi'self, if " virtue is its own 
reward," it's had to wait a devilish long time for it in this case ? 



142 

" Patience on a monument smiling at grief," is pretty good 
for expressing an ordinary serenity of the soul, but a very 
unequal symbol wben applied to tlie resigned and desperate 
cheerfulness of this hopeful and enduring old lady. How 
this excellent and energetic woman has labored and slaved 
for the temporal welfare of her dear offspring! and how 
conscientiously has she scratched over the barren soil in the 
vain pursuit of crumbs for this only chicken ! Here is a 
lesson of perseverance that is worthy of being placed before 
the young. A person that has stuck to it for the last 
twenty-five years, intent on the sole object of promoting 
Miss Fatima's interest— ckessing her herself with a distress- 
ing exuberance — standing up in hot, crowded rooms, for 
hours at a time, till the beaded agony of rebeUious bunions 
rolls from her false and foxy front — hanging out all sorts of 
signals of distress in hopes of calling attention, not so much 
to her own forlorn hulk, as to the unctuous offspring — losing 
her shoe, or dropping her handkerchief, as a dernier resort^ 
or by some other innocent casualty, secure the chance of 
thanking the polite individual, and in that way keep him 
hooked for the time being, and perhcqos retaining a perma- 
nent acquaintance, that may bo induced to honor her 
delightful conversationales^ in A\iiicli the feast of reason is 
expected to be so bountiful as to preclude the necessity of 
any refreshments, save a very economical supply of lemonade 
and gnngerbread ; Mrs. G. thinks anything more substantial 
might, by monopolizing the gastric juices, produce an indi- 
gestion amongst her guests, and so dim, perhaps, the bright 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 143 

rays of some literary luminaries. Siicli is her philosophy of 
the human stomach at hoine. If we may believe Dr. 
Magpie, however, her devotion to the delicacies of the table 
in public does not tally precisely with home theories. Of 
one thing there is no doubt, and that is, that at the end of 
the table where she and her daughter are, the amount of 
business done is attested by the at!ida\it of more than one 
gentleman, Avhose undivided attentions seldom permit much 
opportunity for ministering to their own appetites. 

Mrs. Gabby's ruling passion is more, however, in her httle 
reunions — quiet, cozy little gatherings, of masculine nota- 
bles of every description — all selected with a motherly 
sagacity, ever mindful of certain possible results that may 
arise from her darling's countless fascinations. Her invita- 
tions are regarded oft times as a species of " attachments," 
entrusted to "Brown" instead of the sheriff The fortunate 
recipients of her pressing missives, feel that they are 
marked men^ and are conscious that nothing is to be done 
but to summon up their self-pos.session and save themselves, 
if they can, from the dangers of the wily conspiracies that 
may be laid for their captivity. Old Frizzletop has no idea 
of asking any ladies to join in her festi\ities, to destroy the 
unity of her household attractions. She has seen the 
calamities that spring from numbei's in the softer sex ; indeed 
I may say she has felt it, when in the gardens of Beauty she 
had to take her chicken and go to the wall. Of course she 
does not think that there is such a thing as other ladies 
being superior to her daughter in attractions ; how could she 



14:4 

think any thing so improbable as that ; and therefore, the 
young gentlemen who appear to be very well pleased in 
other quarters, are commisserated by her as deficient in 
taste and cultivated appreciation. In thus keeping Miss 
Fatima as the sole centre of social attraction, she has been, 
is, and will probably continue to be, in hope that somebody 
or other will imagine they can't be entirely happy unless 
through the possession of Miss F. I have said that she 
excluded the " feminines ;" but in justice to this matronly 
speculator, I will give her the credit of the shrew^dness dis- 
played in sending occasionally for Miss Mumpy to come 
round and help her entertain. Miss Mumpy is not, so far as 
ersonal attractions are concerned, a very dangerous lady — 
being a tough, dumpy, " double twist " little lady, in a dark 
skin and a black dress, who is very willing, for the sake of a 
cup of tea and a few seed cakes, to play the foil to her 
patroness's daughter, by helping her play duets, and showing 
by her well-affected stupidity. Miss Fatima's stupendous wit 
and intellectual vivacity. Besides, while the dear daughter 
is making herself destructive, under the curtain of couleur de 
rose, (a conjy cCetat of mamma's contriving,) which serves the 
double purpose of l^nnging a tolerably white arm in gleam- 
ing bas-7'elief, and shading a very pustulous and oily com- 
plexion. Miss Mumpy takes her stand where she may be the 
focus of a bilious, concentrating light, and in a noiseless and 
mouse-like manner, takes every method to make her murky 
little face look as bad and as black as possible. 

Many and many a Miss Mumpy there is, fulfilling the 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 145 

same quiet, obscure kind of destiny ; living as it were out of 
the world, and out of the world's knowledge. And how 
seldom are the cardinal virtues that grace their character 
called out to receive even a slender acknowledgment ! Their 
fate is akin to that which befalls hundreds of others, whose 
philanthropy the world has no hesitation to take advantage 
of, but for which it never feels under obhgation. 

It has been reserved for Mrs. Gabby, to indicate the kind 
of prizes that young authors should strive for. All mothers 
must appreciate the measure, as one which appeals to their 
interest and sympathies in the strongest manner. Whether 
she will be able to carry her point, and make the rule uni- 
versal, remains somewhat undecided, until we see what dis- 
position she will make in the case of her own bewitching 
heir. Her prospects, thus fiir, are not particularly flattering ; 
but the well known perseverance with which she has, for so 
many years, followed her plan, may be the means of giving 
her, in the end, a complete and glorious success. If this de- 
sirable consummation ever does take place, all admhers of the 
meek and lowly virtues will hope and pray, that Miss Mum- 
py's humble instrumentahty, may not go altogether unre- 
warded, and that Miss M. herself, may one day fall in with 
some one who may be proud of being the means of hfting 
her from obscurity, to a condition in which the practical 
goodness of her character, by an ampler sphere of action, 
may challenge the admiration it deserves. How is it, that 
so many are putting matrimonial advertisements in the pa- 
pers, when hundreds of good, domestic, benevolent ladies 



146 NEW-YORK aristocracy; or, 

might be had for the asking, and whose quahfications to 
make a home dehghtful are a thousand per cent, above those 
who it seems are so difficult to obtain ? 

The dear Fatima is, of course, taken through the rounds 
of summer campaigns, such a course having been prescribed 
as necessary for all our American ladies ; necessary, on ac- 
count of the opportunity afforded to get up a false and dis- 
gusting notoriety, by showing an incongruous multitude, that 
i a style of fancy ball dress, " co77imencing (as Talleyrand says), 
; too late and ending too soon,'' may render certain charms 
piquant, which were very low down in the home market. 
From Barnum down, w^e see this same uncontrollable desire 
of men, either to deceive themselves or to be deceived by 
others. This is one of the horrible fatalities of our common 
nature, enough to make a man afraid of himself every hour 
in the day, knowing that he is carrying such a traitor in his 
own heart. In the name of all that is rational, what earthly 
motive can possess one to go to Saratoga or Newport, to bind 
himself bhndfold to a bundle of damnable deception, in tau- 
dry silk and cotton lace ? Why not make his selection w^hen 
he can find his subjects at home, where he can see them 
(sometimes at any rate) divested of tinsel and paint, and as 
nearly natural as it is possible for woman to be (articled as 
she is, from lisping time, to deception), and where his own 
judgment, uninfluenced by the jugglery of Gipsy hats, or the 
absorbing heresies of certain articles with a deep insertion of 
point d'arme lace, can exercise itself dispassionately ? 

One word, ye chivalry of the South, with a pocket full of 



GEMS OF JArONICA-DOM. liT 

rocks ! Ye English cockneys, full of beef, ignorance and con- 
ceit, and foreignei-s generally, and natives, take heed ; don't 
make fools of YOiu-selves by wanting to marry these exciting 
s^^eciraens of the sex, because, for sooth, your senses are sent 
spinning, when a tight gloved hand disposes (oh, how know- 
ingly) ! just enough of flo^^ing drapeiy to betray a tighter 
gaiter with a little heel, or a pink shpper with a big rosette. 
Forget, if you can, the gleaming curve of a hp that smiled 
only hj accident; the blue of that tender eye, that 
seems unconciously ri vetted upon your perfections ; the flut- 
ter of that handkerchief, fiUing the atmosphere of its owner 
with an odor of the most dehcate mille Jieurs ; the heavy 
silk that kept within its tenacious woof, the indescribable 
aroma that prevades the orbit of a revolving sp-en ; forget 
all these things for you see them through a distempered me- 
dium : they are the merest bubbles, that will break in your 
face ; the A^•hole thing 

" An ' ignis fatims," that bewitches, 
And leads men into pools and ditches," 

and to numberless other conditions, where the fallacy that 
caused them, will be most painfully realized. Woman, no 
doubt, is a dehghtful hobby, but quite as well to be amused 
by at home, while you are unstrapped and in dressing-gown, 
as while drinking Congi-ess water at crowded hotels, or surf- 
bathing at sandy seaports. The aperient character of Sara- 
toga and Sharon aii-s, contributes no doubt to the facility with 
which bodily absorption is performed ; and nothing less sweep- 
ing or saline, than the douche bath of an ocean wave, could 
wash awav the surfeit of silliness, which is there induced. 



14S NEW-YOEK AEISTOCKACY ; OK, 

There are many ladies, who hke our Fatima, have made 
calculations on imposing their antiquities on travelling green- 
horns, but have never been able to make it go. Somehow, 
I am inchned to think that the secret has got but that water- 
ing places are great traps to " catch gudgeons," or else that 
mamas have given their 3^oungsters a bit of warning against 
the dangers incidental to summer sojourning, reminded per- 
haps by Mr. Longon's experience, that fatal summer, he made 
his appearance at Newport. Mr. Longon (whose acquaint- 
ance, the reader should have had an opportunity of making 
long before this), is a very ductile mass of humanity, as was 
proven, by the easy manner in which he w\as led off by a 
halter, in the hand of one of the Fustian ladies, who had long 
been kept back to concentrate her chicanery on this " Hnked 
sweetness long drawn out." Poor fellow, he submitted to his 
destiny as to an inevitable fate. A certain other young gen- 
tleman was found more fractious ; and though at one time 
fairly noosed, shpped his collar, and broke for cover in good 
earnest. Be sure he had more brains than Longon ; and the 
best judges are of the opinion now, that he did the whole 
thing just for " flyer," he being given occasinally to that in- 
nocent recreation. There w^as Theocritus Krimble, told my 

fi-iend that one of these dear, undesigning ladies, 

knowing him to be a stranger to their duphcities, act- 
ually made demonstration on him. From the account 
given, it is fair to infer, that before they got through, it oc- 
curred to them, that there was one Mr. Krimble, who occa- 
sionally " knew a hawk from a handsaw," their united efforts 



GEMS OF JAPONICA-DOM. 14:9 

to tlie contrary notwithstanding. People should not under- 
take to play " Delilah," unless they have Delilah's beauty ! 

Theocritus, though not indigenous to Gotham, is hke to 
prove a very prominent and desirable adjunct to upper- 
tendom. His residence will be the means of bringing a new 
genus into the walks of fashion. Hitherto the miserable 
poodles who have aspired to celebrity by a wishy-washy 
style of dandyism, have only brought contempt and ridicule 
upon their efforts at refined elegance in sentiment, address, or 
apparel ; but if Theocritus will only continue under the 7:)re5- 
tige that nature has evidently designed for him, his fine per- 
son and gentlemanly quahties of heart, may place him in the 
front rank of modern Brummels. My artist, I see, has intro- 
duced him hat in hand, with an elbow resting on the pier 
table, in the cut illustrating a morning reception at Mrs. 
Hats's. He is evidently wondering at what part of evidence 
in the late trial Mrs. H. is being interrupted by an illustrious 
sop, who, unable to comprehend the vast influence of the 
morning paper she is holding in her hands, is inquiring 
whether she does not ever read the abolition doctrines and 
disgusting agrarianism of certain other journals. Be it said 
to her credit that the idea is indigiiantly repudiated. So 
watchful an old crocodile as Mrs. Gabby was not likel}^ to 
overlook the advantages presented in the person of Mr. 
Krimble, upon whose sensibilities she calculated to operate 
by one of those masterly movements in ^9a^7ie^/c diplomacy, 
for which she has made herself eminent. I am inchned to 
think that she missed her figure in this aflfair, very badly 



160 NEW-YOEK aristocracy; or, 

indeed. Mr. Theocritus having been abroad, is not the most 
likely person to be caught napping. It is a well known fact 
that httle revei-ses of this nature have but small effect upon 
the cast iron character of Mrs. G's. fortitude. She has ex- 
perienced those sort of disheartening deplumations so many- 
times, as to look on each such misfortune, as but another step 
towards acquiring the martyr's crown. Some people never 
break down under adversity, but (like iron that grows harder by 
successive fires) bear up on some unknown principle, until they 
become indurated saints, or moral ossifications. If Old Gabby 
keeps on facing ill luck with the same christian hardihood, 
she will rank among the first of hving martp-s. Fatima 
stands it remarkably well also ; probably she has a little of 
the hereditary warhorse about her. She maintains her 
bulk, and with first rate prospects of '■''more a cominP You 
see them at parties always presenting the same undaunted 
front, never faint hearted, and just as cheerful in their neg- 
lect, as if they were the cpiosure of attraction. I should 
like, had I the space to give my readers an insight to the pri- 
vate opinions of this critical duo, upon certain persons and 
^imilies who pretend to look down on them. How they 
would like to give the imperial Howlers a small dig, on their 
being in direct descent from a cabin boy ! how they would 
enjoy cracking their whip over the Primmin family, whose 
reputation was gained from a' splendid fellow on the box ! and 
how they would rejoice in being allowed to tell that numer- 
ous family, the Shavers (who think in their immaculate 
conceit, that thev are verilv the salt of the earth, the elect of 



GEMS OF JAPONIC A-DOM. 151 

botli worlJs), tliat they know Avho built their old country 
house, as well as that the struggle which gave om- country 
her independence gave birth, at the same time, to a good 
patriot, and a better carpenter. But I am reminded that the 
limits allotted to this form of 2:)ublication, like time and 
tide, wait for no man. '* '^ * There remains for me 
the unsatisfactory duty of closing these sketches, with this 
number. It had been my intention to have introduced many 
other studies from similar subjects, equally worthy of presen- 
tation to the enlightened apprehensions of our wonder loving, 
and astonished citizens ; but the execution " of such a plan 
would have imposed (from the infinite shades and gradations 
of the so-called exclusives) the necessity of going to an extent 
and detail in statements that had little to do \nih the original 
intention of this work, which certainly aimed more at tran- 
scribing the few characters, who have, and are trying to "set 
the North river on fire," than of taking up fashionable gen- 
ealogy with the idea of making myself either the subject of 
a vote of thanks, or an object of tender solicitude with those 
who expect thereby the foundation of their own fame and 
fortunes. Since the commencement of these sketches, the 
author could not (even in an almost entire seclusion from the 
world) well have avoided certain rumors that were rife, to 
the effect that their personal character has been satisfactorily 
established. If people ivill take up stray ends of expressions 
or technical allusions, and make an imaginary application, why 
of com-se, I shall not try and prevent them. If this extreme 
sensitiveness could be kept for other occasions, some portions 



152 NEW-YOEK AEISTOCRACY. 

of the conimimity would not have to bhish for the other as 
often as they do. The author thinking (perhaps with van- 
ity), that his patrons would feel some curiosity to see his like 
ness, has so far overcome the dissuading of his natui*al modes- 
ty, as to allow its striking truthfulness and beauty to grace the 
title page in the bound numbers; To those who are rendered 
for ever celebrated, as the subjects of these humble efforts, I 
would address myself (vfith the substitution of one word in 
our vernacular) in the language of Ovid : 

" Jamque (Aristocracy) exegl, quod nee Jovis ira, nee ignis, 
Nee poterit ferrum, nee edax abolere vetustas.'" 

And. now, like a poor fellow under the gallows, who is 
allowed as a particular favor, to express himself before the fatal 
cap is drawn, I have but a few words to add, and those onty 
by way of apology for sundry typographical errors, that at 
any rate do not increase the beauty of my work. An extra 
page or so of " Errata,'' would have set all right, but I have 
concluded to let the critical reader rectify the mistakes as he 
meets them, for they were all the devil's fault, not mine, and 
I don't fancy interfering further in a matter where that gen- 
tlemen is concerned. 



LHJa'07 



^ 



